AGED      POET      SUCCUMBS. 
CINCINNATI,    January   I'.xCoat- 
the  poet,  died  of  the  grippe  at  the  Presbyteriai: 
Hospital  cere  to-night,  aged  seventy-sis, 

OHIO'S  SWEET  SINGER 

SUCCUMBS   TO   GRIPPE. 


Coates  Kinney,  the  Xcnia  Poet.  Dies 
j  in  a  Hospital  at  Cin- 

cinnati. 


CINCINNATI.  January  2o.-Coates 
Kinney.  the  author  and  poet,  died  of  the 
grippe  at  the  Presbyterian  Hospital  here 
to-night. 


Coates    Kinney    was    born    at    Kinney's 
Corners.    N.    Y.,    op     November    2U.    lS2b, 
but    in    his    fourteenth    year    his    parents 
removed    to    Ohio.      His    early    education 
was    obtained    in    the    common    schools, 
but    ho    later    spent    a    term    at    Antioch 
College,   where  he  commenced   the  study 
of   the   law.     In  1856  h<*   was   admitted   to 
the   bar.    but   soon   afterward    abandoned 
his   practice  and   entered   tne  journalistic 
field.     Among:  other  papers  he  edited   the 
Xenia    Torchlight,    the   Cincinnati   Times 
and   the   Springfield   Republican.     During! 
the  Civil   War  he  was  a  Major  and  pay- 
inaist^r  in    the  United    States  Army,   and 
at     its     close     was     mustered     out     with 
brevet    rank    of    Lieutenant-Colonel.      In 
1881-82  he  was  elected  to  the  Ohio  Senate. 
His  literary  talent,  developed  early  in  his 
career,    his    first    work,    "Kenka,"'    being: 
published      in      1S55.      His    most    famous 
lyric,  "Rain  on  the  Roof,"  was  published 
In    JS90    in    a    volume    entitled    "Mists    of, 
Fire    and    Some    Eclogues."      Because    ofj 
his    masterly    clearness      of      expression  ? 
Kinn^y    was    esteemed    by    many    of    his  ? 
, admirers   to  be  the  American  Browning.  I 
«.       r 


University  of  California  •  Berkeley 

Gift  of 
Roger  DeNault 


I 


» 


<r 

KEEUKA 

AND  OTHER  POEMS 


BY 

COATES-KINNEY. 


PRIVATE   EDITION. 

PUBLISHED    BY    THE    AUTHOR 
1855. 


Entered  according  to  act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1854,  by 
COATES-KINNEY, 

In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  United  States  for  the  District 
of  Ohio. 


TO 

CHAKLES  SHERMAN  ABBOTT, 

OF  CINCINNATI, 

MY    BEST     FRIEND, 

AS  A  HUMBLE  TRIBUTE  TO  UNOSTENTATIOUS  TALENT,  GENEBOUS  SENTIMENT, 
AND  INSTINCTIVE  INTEOBITY, 


IS  RESPECTFULLY  DEDICATED. 

THE  AUTHOR. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE. 

KEEUKA, 9 

\RAIN  ON  THE  HOOF, 87 

THE  HEROES  OF  THE   PEN, 90 

THRENODY  FOR  FLORA, 94 

ON  !  EIGHT  ON  ! 96 

THE  EDEN  OF  WISHES, 98 

CAROLINE, 101 

MABELLE, 103 

IMMORTAL  GLORY, , 105 

EMMA  STUART, 108 

To  MY  WIFE, Ill 

THE  END  OF  THE  RAINBOW, 113 

MISGIVING, 116 

EYES, 119 

MlNNEHAHA, 121 

A  SONG  FOR  THE  CRATS, 124 

LEGEND  OF  THE  ALABAMA, 127 


vi  CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 

WRESTLING, 132 

REMINISCENCES, 134 

THE  LAND  EEDEEMED, 137 

LITTLE  FANNY, 141 

To  ELIZA  LOGAN, 145 

THE  SPIRIT'S  RESPONSE, 147 

LOVE, 150 

SCOTTISH  SONG, 153 

To  OTWAY  CURRY, 155 

ON  AN  INDIAN'S  GRAVE,..                                                                        .  157 


KEEUKA:  AN  AMERICAN  LEGEND. 


KEEUKA: 

AN  AMERICAN  LEGEND. 


CANTO  I, 
i. 

WEBE  mine  the  language  Sappho  wont  to  sing, 
Whose  tones  were  brooks  of  honey  in  the  soul ; 
Could  I  the  full  Hellenic  thunders  fling 
Down  from  sublime  thought's  empyrean  pole, 
With  Argive  auditors  to  hear  them  roll, 
Then  mote  I  not  in  vain  invoke  the  Muse, 
Whose  mythic  spells  of  inspiration  stole 
Upon  old  bards,  and  filled  their  hearts,  as  dews 
Mysterious  fill  the  buds,  with  glory's  folded  hues. 


10  KEEUKA. 

V"  v  < 
^ 

II. 

*T  * 

But  most  the  power  I  lack ;  for  Saxon  speech, 
Though  rough  as  ragged  ocean,  yet  is  grand 
As  the  great  sound  of  billows  on  the  beach, 
That  winds  in  wrath  scourge  bellowing  to  land. 
Yet,  though  the  Muse  ne  beck  me  with  her  hand 
Up  where  Parnassian  rills  of  passion  flow, 
Where  fancy's  rainbows  brilliantly  are  spanned 
Above  thought's  purest,  most  ethereal  snow, 

Pathless  I  meekly  sing  this  museless  lay  below. 

• 

*•  *  . 

m."  '-<'•%• 

Now  welcome,  Lake  Keeuka !  hail  to  thee, 
Thou  hill-hugged  bosom  of  blue  waters,  hail ! 
Dark  clouds  of  sorrow  have  flocked  over  me, 
And  snowed  upon  this  young  hair,  since  my  sail, 
Coquetting  with  the  sighful  summer  gale, 
Wont  to  dance  daintily  thy  waves  along ; 
Yet  ne'er  thy  scenes,  recalled  in  fancy,  fail 
With  pleasant  memories  my  soul  to  throng ; 
And  haply  such  may  grace  this  legendary  song. 


KEEUKA.  11 

•'-J^'.*:  IV- 

Thou  crystal  chamber  of  the  rambling  brooks ! — 
Where,  after  play,  they  prattle  home  to  sleep — 
How  oft  I  long  for  thy  delightsome  nooks, 
Whereround  the  bosky  banks  rise  high  and  steep,. 
And  calm  inclosed  the  basined  waters  keep ! 

There  my  canoe  would  float  in  summer  time, 

•  «,  ^ 

And  I  dream  dreams  that  in  my  bosom  deep 
Are  germs  of  thought  now  in  an  other  clime ; 
And  sometime  one  of  these  thus  blossomed  into  rhyme : 

1. 
Twin  of  the  summer  sky 

Azurn  above,  •* 
Soft  as  a  maiden's  eye 
Swimming  in  love, 
Is  the  Keeuka. 

2. 
Into  its  bosom  blue 

Early  birds  fly, 
Oft  as  they  wake  anew, 
Taking  for  sky 
Crystal  Keeuka. 


12 


KEEUKA. 


3. 

Morning's  red  pinions  fly 

Over  its  breast, 
And  the  night's  bashful  eye 

Looks  from  the  west 
Into  Keeuka. 


Clumps  of  the  olden  woods 

Yet  o'er  its  brink 
Stoop  down  their  leafy  hoods 

As  if  to  think, 
By  the  Keeuka, 


5. 

Of  the  brave  werowance 

Wont  to  roam  here, 
Or  the  squaw  maiden's  glance 
Into  the  clear 
Breast  of  Keeuka. 


KEEUKA.  13 

6. 

Then,  when  the  moonlight  shone 

Down  on  the  blue, 
Here  and  there  glode  a  lone 

Indian  canoe 
O'er  the  Keeuka. 


7. 

Here  sat  the  savage  maid 

In  the  dark  cove, 
Where  the  low  ripples  played, 

Watching  her  love 
On  the  Keeuka. 


8. 

Then  all  was  forest  here, 
And,  like  the  moose, 

Tameless  and  free  of  fear, 
Played  the  pappoose 
Round  the  Keeuka. 


14  KEEUKA 


9. 

But  the  red  forest  clans 


Fled  fatherland, 


Where  now  the  palefaced  man's 
Villages  stand 
By  the  Keeuka. 


10. 

Yet  the  blue  waters  look 
Upward  as  bright 

As  ere  the  Indian  took 
Westward  his  flight 
From  the  Keeuka. 


11. 

So,  through  all  ages  and 

Changes  of  time, 
Truth  shall  a  mirror  stand, 

Calm  and  sublime, 
Like  the  Keeuka. 


KEEUKA.  15 

V. 

The  clan  that  whilome  dwelt  upon  this  shore, 
And  rowed  the  lake,  and  roamed  the  forest  grand, 
On  earth  wield  bow  and  tomahawk  no  more ; 
For  they  have  all  gone  to  the  Spirit  Land. 
In  sooth,  they  were  a  fierce  and  faithful  band, 
Kind  unto  friend  and  cruel  unto  foe ; 
With  one,  the  peacepipe  passed  from  hand  to  hand, 
With  other  meeting,  fatal  blood  must  flow : 
They  loved,  they  hated,  and  they  knew  no  morals  moe. 


VI. 

Poor,  simple  savages  !  they  ne'er  had  learned 
Mock  virtue's  many  words  and  ways  of  guile ; 
If  sense  of  wrong  within  their  bosom  burned, 
It  shone  outside  not  in  a  glozing  smile, 
But  lit  the  eye  in  nature's  noble  style  ; 
Nor  brooked  they  insult's  buffet  on  the  cheek, 
To  turn  the  other  Christianly  the  while  ; 
But  whoso  outrage  dared  to  do  or  speak, 
Prepared  for  peril :  arm !  and  on  him  vengeance  wreak 


16  KEEUKA. 

VII. 

Thus  they  dispensed  with  that  infernal  scheme 
Of  wordy  mysteries  in  musty  tomes, 
Which  mimics  justice  with  the  little  gleam 
Of  right  and  reason  in  the  brain  of  monies 
That  practice  twaddle  in  forensic  domes, 
Where  Impudence  gulps  nonsense  to  the  lees, 
And  thence  in  gaseous  fermentation  foams : 
Ne  need  of  such  a  lore  of  lies  had  these 
WTio  dwelt  here  by  the  troutbrooks  underneath  the  trees. 


VIII; 

% 
Nor  needed  that  stupendous  fiction  they, 

Whereby  an  image  stamped  upon  an  ore, 
Becomes  a  god,  to  which  men  homage  pay 
Devoutly,  and  which  ardently  adore ; 
For  game  through  wood,  and  in  the  water  store 
Of  fish,  were  equal  to  their  vital  want ; 
(They  wanted  life,  and  wanted  little  more ;) 
Among  them  nor  d^  gilded  Greatness  flaunt, 
Nor  pining  Poverty  their  happy  homeplace  haunt. 


KEETJKA. 

IX. 

In  very  deed,  their  language  did  ignore 
Even  the  words  of  wealth ;  for  Commerce  yet 
Here  on  the  water  and  along  the  shore 
Her  many-mottoed  seal  had  never  set, 
With  cant  of  loss  and  profit,  tare  and  tret : 
Ne  hunks  was  hero  in  the  savage  life, 
Nor  smockfaced  Foppery  mote  honor  get ; 
But  eloquence,  and  prowess  in  the  strife 
With  tomahawk  and  warclub,  bow  and  battleknife. 


X. 

So  they,  ere  mother  Nature  had  grown  old, 
Her  dearest  children,  at  her  wholesome  breast 
Drank  life,  and  felt  her  fond  arms  round  them  fold, 
And  her  sweet  bosom  to  their  hearts  be  pressed ; 
Nor  nursing  Art  had  ever  them  caressed, 
Or  dandled  yet  on  her  adoptive  knee, 
Like  as  her  fosterchildren,  cursed  and  blessed 
With  knowledge,  who  had  come  across  the  sea 

To  damn  the  future  of  the  ignorantly  free. 

2 


18  KEEUKA. 

j 

XI. 

Yet  what  the  nation  of  the  copper  clan 
That  peopled  here  the  lakeside  long  ago, 
Or  how  afar  their  russet  race  began, 
Or  whence  their  dusky  blood  mote  have  its  flow, 
In  good  sooth,  me  it  matters  not  to  know ; 
Enough,  that  truer  Mingoes1  never  drew 
An  arrow  to  the  head,  or  twanged  a  bow, 
Or  battleax  in  warfare  featly  threw, 
Than  the  Keeukas,  dwellers  by  these  waters  blue. 


xn. 

And  from  the  mighty  Mohawk  sagamore,3 
Whene'er,  as  now,  his  fleety  runners  ran 
Through  the  Five  Nations,  making  every  shore 
Of  all  these  linked  lakes  clamor  with  the  ban 
Of  battle,  yelling  it  from  clan  to  clan — 
Rise!  Mingoes,  rise!  your  Agresquee3  invoke, 
And  follow  where  the  Mohawk  leads  the  van! — 
As  the  first  warwhoop  into  echoes  broke, 
The  yare  Keeukas  rallied  at  their  council  oak. 


KEEUKA.  19 

XIII. 

It  was  a  grandly  overtopping  tree, 
That  full  five  hundred  years  had  seen,  or  moe, 
Since  in  its  lithesome  youth  it  danced  the  glee 
Which  piping  winds  wont  through  its  branches  blow ; 
But  now  it  bowed  its  head  sublimely  slow, 
Still  youthful,  though  majestically  old ; 
For  it  alate  had  shaken  off  the  snow, 
Old  age's  token,  and  anew  did  hold 
Its  green  magnificence  up  in  the  morning's  gold. 


XIY. 

Upon  the  stilly  smoothness  of  the  lake 
The  glaring  glory  of  the  rising  sun 
Lay  molten ;  meanwhile  musically  brake 
The  woodbirds  into  matins,  one  with  one 
Altern  or  choral,  yet  discordant  none. 
Awakened  from  the  sweet  sleep  they  had  slept, 
As  if  in  sorrow  that  their  dreams  were  done, 
The  young  leaves  tearfully  the  dewdrops  wept, 
And  to  the  breeze  that  roused  them,  low  complaining  kept. 


20  KEEUKA. 

^ 

XY. 

Here,  after  clamor,  were  the  lakers  met 
At  the  fresh  prime  in  silence.     All  had  died 
The  echoes ;  and  with  dewy  weeping  wet, 
The  leaves,  whose  plaints  the  brisk  brooks  did  deride, 
Brightening  gan  whisper,  as  they  now  espied 
The  gathered  council.     In  the  center  rose 
The  chief,  Moneeka :  he  from  side  to  side 
Prelusive  eyeglance  of  mute  meaning  throws, 
And  then  in  lava  speech  his  soul  volcanic  flows. 


XVI. 

"Our  kinsmen  cry  to  us  from  out  their  blood ! 
Then-  ghosts  went  scalpless  to  the  Spirit  Land! 
How  many  seasons  more  shall  fall  and  bud, 
Ere  we  avenge  them  with  the  bloody  hand  ? 
The  Mohawk  leads  the  Nations  Triple-Clanned  ;4 
Him  follow  to  the  death  in  glory's  trail  I 
Ere  three  more  glooms  have  wrapped,  or  mornings  fanned 
The  forest,  smite  the  vile  Catawbas  pale ! 
For  each  our  kindred  slain,  make  ten  their  widows  wail ! 


KEEUKA.  21 

£ 

XYII. 

Last  midnight  I  stood  yonder  on  the  cliff, 
While  the  Great  Spirit's  many  starry  eyes 
Were  gazing  on  me,  and  with  every  whiff 
Of  winds  among  the  pinetops,  there  did  rise 
The  shriek  of  some  soul  unavenged.     Disguise 
Your  faces  with  the  paint !     Anoint  your  hair ! 
Fill  up  your  quivers  !     Make  the  woods  and  skies 
Ring  with  your  warsong !     Go  ye  and  prepare 
The  feast  of  blood  for  brothers  shrieking  in  the  air !" 


XVIII. 

So  ended  he :  forthwith  five  hundred  throats 
Him  hoarsely  grunted  guttural  applause  ;5 
Then,  clamoring  in  wrath's  barbarian  notes, 
Demanded  lead  them  whereso  vengeance  was, 
In  crouching  ambush  or  in  battle's  jaws. 
Again  came  silence,  deep  as  slumbers  bring 
To  night's  mid  darkness,  but  of  briefer  pause ; 
For  fiercely  now  the  braves  began  to  sing, 
And  full-fledged  fury  rose  on  music's  wildest  wing. 


22  KEEUKA. 

1. 

By  the  widows  bewailing 
The  horrible  slaughters, 

By  the  bones  of  our  brothers 
Picked  bare  by  the  ravens, 
By  the  tears  unavailing 
Of  fatherless  daughters 
And  sorrowing  mothers, 
Revenge  on  the  cravens ! 
Eevenge!  revenge! 


2. 
i 

Ere  the  grapes  begin  bunching 
By  brook  and  by  fountain, 

Ere  the  broods  of  young  throstles 

Burst  into  sweet  laughter, 
The  wolves  shall  be  munching 
Our  foes  on  the  mountain, 
And  bloody  scalptossels 
Shall  swing  from  the  rafter ! 
Revenge!  revenge! 


KEEUKA.  23 

3. 

Now,  ye  souls  of  our  brothers, 
Unlaid  and  in  trouble, 

Cease  shrieking  and  sighing; 

For  ere  in  his  blanket 
The  Great  Spirit  smothers 
This  moon,  there  shall  bubble 
Hot  blood  from  hearts  dying, 
And  ye  shall  have  drank  it ! 
Kevenge!  revenge! 


XIX. 

Now  died  the  hideously  mournful  strain — 
The  mad  monotonous  refrain  did  rave 
Itself  to  death,  and  into  stillness  wane ; 
But  the  echoes  yet  its  elfin  spirit  save, 
And  bear  it  over  blue  Keeuka's  wave ; 
Toss  it  from  steep  to  steep  along  the  shore, 
And  beat  it  crying  through  each  rocky  cave. 
Straightway  the  council  broke,  and  savage  tore 
'The  vail  of  heaven  with  their  whooped  outrageous  roar. 


24:  KEEUKA. 

XX. 

And  next  they  scattered  each  a  several  way ; 
Some  to  their  wigwams  nigh,  and  some  to  boat, 
Where,  tethered  in  the  ripples'  tiny  sway, 
The  prim  prows  on  the  pebbly  margin  smote, 
As  though  along  the  blue  to  be  afloat 
They  felt  a  live  impatience.     Then  the  dip 
Of  paddles  beat  time  all  the  while  each  throat 
Uttered  a  low,  wild  chant,  unstopped  by  lip,6 
And  so  the  trim  canoes  did  o'er  the  waters  trip. 


XXI. 

The  voices,  with  the  distance,  tapered  down 
To  silence ;  and  thence  till  the  setting  sun 
The  plumy  thrapple  of  the  mockbird  brown, 
Swoln  full  of  rich,  round  warble,  glibly  spun 
Its  tangled  string  of  carols,  never  done : 
The  tunable  lovetwitter  round  the  nests, 
The  susurration  of  the  bees,  the  run 
Of  quick  brooks,  blent  their  sweet  sounds,  till  the  west's 
Vanguard  of  hosting  stars  displayed  their  brilliant  crests. 


KEEUKA.  25 

XXII. 

What  time  the  twilight  thickened  into  gloom, 
A  dome  of  flame  shot  up  its  flashing  spire 
Beside  the  lake,  as  though  for  Day  a  tomb 
Were  built  there — dead  Day's  monument  of  fire. 
Keeuka's  face  glowed  sudden  red  with  ire, 
Uncurtained  thus  of  darkness  in  her  sleep  ; 
And  all  at  once  one  whooping  hubbub  dire, 
Like  roaring  ocean,  swept  the  forest  deep, 
Then  sunk  in  echoing  ebb,  a  tide  of  noises  neap. 


XXIII. 

The  light  upon  the  beach  was  for  a  token ; 
The  startling  whoops,  responses  to  the  sign ; 
And  now,  amid  a  silentness  unbroken, 
Into  the  circle  of  that  signaled  shine, 
From  out  the  dark  of  thickets'  branchy  twine, 
There  glided  tall  forms,  flocking  all  the  shore ; 
While  o'er  the  water,  flame-wrought  into  wine, 
The  same  canoes  that  had  at  morn  tofore, 

And  toward  that  ruddy  glare  was  pointed  every  prore. 
3 


26  KEEUKA. 

XXIY. 

Anon  each  slender  bark  its  beak  had  strook, 
And  each  swart  rower  leaped  upon  the  strand ; 
Portent  of  battle  scowled  in  every  look, 
And  clutched  the  tomahawk  in  every  hand. 
Ah !  then  to  see  the  banded  cohort  stand 
In  sullen  circle  round  that  reaching  blaze, 
It  was  the  dread  sublime,  the  gloomy  grand : 
Their  frightful  features  hold  a  dismal  gaze, 
And  not  among  them  one  one  sign  of  life  betrays. 


XXY. 

For  brief  thus  motionless  and  mute  stood  they ; 
Then;  as  from  impulse  of  one  common  thought, 
Burst  into  brutal  war's  infernal  bray, 
To  horrid  dissonance  of  fury  wrought : 
With  hungry  foretaste  of  revenge  distraught, 
In  dance  they  raged,  in  frantic  song  they  ranted ; 
The  onslaught  shammed,  the  mimic  battle  fought, 
And  gorged  the  feast,  which  late  with  life  had  panted  ; 
Nor  ceased  until  the  moon  her  downward  journey  slanted. 


KEEUKA.  27 

XXYI. 

The  fire  had  dwindled,  and  the  moon  gone  down  ; 
The  stars  were  waiting  for  the  king  of  day, 
To  bow  their  fealty  to  his  golden  crown, 
And  then  from  his  dread  presence  shrink  away  • 
Deep  in  the  dreaming  lake's  clear  bosom  lay 
A  vision  of  the  heavens  :  save  the  trill 
Of  night's  lone  troubadour  upon  the  spray, 
Poet  of  birds,  the  mournful  whippowil, 
Where  late  loud  orgies  roared,  now  all  was  widely  still. 


CANTO  II. 
i. 

FORTH  victor  Dawn  his  flamy  banner  flung 
Over  the  east  horizon's  battlement ; 
Yet  Night's  forlorn  hope,  Lucifer,  yclung, 
Last  of  her  bright  host,  to  the  sky's  blue  tent 
Till  round  him  it  was  all  on  fire  ;  upsent 
The  birds  their  sweet  applauses  ;  blushed  the  water 
Under  the  ardent  gaze  of  Orient : 
Again  were  met  the  warriors  by  the  water, 
And  eke  their  women  mournful,  mother,  wife,  and  daughter. 


KEEUKA.  29 

w 
II. 

Oh  War  !  iconoclast  of  woman's  love  ! 
Thou  breaker  of  the  idols  of  her  heart ! 
Thou  pomp  of  murder,  that  dost  flout  above 
All  penalty !  that  sitst  enthroned  apart 
From  vulgar  crimes,  and  crowned  with  glory  art ! 
While  man  may  so  heroically  die 
That  his  great  name  on  time's  historic  chart 
Shall  loom  through  ages,  woman's  is  the  sigh — 
The  tear,  which  fame's  cold  breath  may  freeze,  but  can  not  dry. 


in. 

Again  were  met  the  warriors  by  the  water ; 
And,  sooth,  they  showed  romantic  to  the  view ; 
Wood-born  Bellona,  Nature's  wanton  daughter, 
Contrasted  gayly  with  the  dark  green  hue 
Of  her  plain  mother's  garb,  begemmed  with  dew 
Kirtles  of  red  from  zone  to  middle  thigh, 
Their  plumes  of  scarlet,  moccasins  of  blue, 
Their  skins  tattooed  with  stripes  of  every  dye, 
Combined  as  fine  a  scene  as  ever  flared  to  eye. 


30  KEEUKA. 

IY. 


Upon  their  shoulders  painted  quivers  hung, 
Full  of  the  arrowy  death ;  in  each  right  hand 
The  nervy  bow,  to  half-strained  tension  strung  ; 
And  in  each  bead-embroidered  kirtleband 
The  tomahawk  and  scalpknife :  there  they  stand 
In  conflux  gloomy,  like  a  thundercloud 
Swoln  by  the  winds  and  with  a  rainbow  spanned- 
Relentless  in  revenge,  of  prowess  proud, 
And  yet  with  love's  fond  passion  genially  endowed. 


Y. 


And  though  no  tears  welled  up  to  quench  the  flame 
Of  war's  wild  ardor  blazing  in  their  eyes, 
The  hour  of  parting  to  their  bosoms  came 
With  a  quick  agony ;  the  tender  ties 
Of  home  affections,  braided,  in  the  skies, 
Of  man's  high  nature,  wrought  upon  the  strings 
Of  then-  strong  hearts — Oh !  what  if  this  emprise 
Should  leave  their  bodies  cold  and  breathless  things 
In  far  lands,  clawed  by  wolves  and  flapped  by  ravens'  wings!1 


KEEUKA.  31 

1. 

The  flowers  may  spring  up  in  the  trails 
That  wind  to  where  the  roebucks  dwell — 

The  corn  may  tossel  in  the  vales 

Ere  we  come  home :  farewell !  farewell ! 


Young  moon  may  wax,  and  old  moon  wane, 
And  fall  may  brown,  and  spring  may  bud, 

Nor  we  yet  come  ;  we  may  be  slain, 
Each  sleeping  on  his  mat  of  blood  1 

3. 

But  if  we  never  come  again 

To  greet  home's  kisses,  glad  and  warm, 
Be  sure  that  more  than  Mingo  men 

Were  struck  in  battle's  thunderstorm  ! 

4. 

Farewell !  farewell !  along  the  shore 
Our  boats  are  beating  on  the  shoals  : 

Farewell ! — if  we  come  back  no  more, 
Then,  meet  us  in  the  Land  of  Souls  ! 


32  KEETJKA. 

-J 

VI. 

So  sung  the  sachem ;  all  the  braves  respond 
To  the  sad  chant  with  sorrowful  conclaim ; 
Then  of  his  loved  ones  each  one  takes  a  fond, 
Perchance  a  last  embrace.     But,  hark  !  a  name 
Moneeka  utters  in  a  tone  of  blame : 
Lelu  !  Lelu  !  she  of  the  spirit  bland, 
Image  of  her,  and  only  not  the  same 
That  death  had  taken  to  the  Spirit  Land — 
His  fair  child,  why  not  she  one  of  that  tearful  band? 


VII. 

List !  like  a  choir  of  cuckoos  comes  a  flow 
Of  flutestops  in  the  gushes  of  the  breeze ; 
A  fitful  strain,  now  louder,  now  more  low, 
Now  sweetly  muffled  in  the  thick  of  trees. 
The  timid  squaws,  transported,  fall  to  knees 
In  adoration,  while  from  brave  to  brave 
Fly  ravished  whispers  in  the  tone  of  bees ; 
When,  lo  !  from  out  the  mouth  of  Spirit  Cave 
There  darts  a  light  canoe,  and  glides  along  the  wave. 


KEEUKA.  33 

VIII. 

It  was  Lelu's !  they  knew  it  by  the  beak — 

A  silver  arrow,  flashing  o'er  the  blue 

> 

As  Venus  o'er  the  east  when  morn  doth  wreak 
Its  ardor  on  the  meek,  pale  sky.    It  flew 
The  waters  witchingly,  and  quickly  drew 
Whom  into  sight  it  wafted  ;  lo,  the  Sprite 
Of  Spirit  Cave  !  and  with  him,  lo,  Lelu ! 
She  plied  the  plashing  paddle  left  and  right, 
While  music's  chain  linked  he  with  flying  fingers  light. 


IX. 

Eftsoons  the  tiny  prow  was  laid  aland  ; 
The  music  stopped  ;  and  bounded  up  the  bank 
Fawnlike  Lelu.     The  pretty  boldness  bland 
Of  innocence,  the  modest  meekness  frank 
Of  maidenhood,  did  beautifully  prank 
Her  large  brown  eyes  ;  flowed  down  her  long  black  hair, 
Whereunder  her  round  bosoms  rose  and  sank 
Like  billows  ;  nature's  delicacy  bare 
Adorned  her :  O !  she  was  bewilderingly  fair. 


34:  KEEUKA. 


X. 


Though  in  amazement,  every  warrior's  heart 
Beat  big  responses  to  her  tripping  feet, 
Proud  of  her  loveliness.     Where  stood  apart 
The  wondering  sachem,  thither  soon  her  fleet, 
Light  footsteps  bore  her.     Him  the  sudden  greet 
Of  ardent  lips  roused  from  astonishment — 
The  thrill  of  filial  kisses,  fondly  sweet : 
"Sire,  the  Great  Spirit  my  Okkee2  hath  sent 
To  talk  to  you  of  peace  ere  battle's  bow  be  bent." 


XI. 

She  waved  her  hand,  and  up  the  beach  came  he 
Who  had  so  oft  mysterious  charmed  the  shore 
With  music's  witchery — Lelu's  Okkee : 
Majestical !  his  brow  such  beauty  wore 
As  a  white  cloud  by  sundown  tinted  o'er ; 
His  hair  bright  brown,  his  eyes  were  lakelike  blue, 
And  looked  as  though  they  held  all  heretofore 
And  all  hereafter  in  their  raptured  view, 
And  all  high  knowledge  and  all  holy  passion  knew. 


KEEUKA.  35 

XII. 

He  paused  beside  the  old  oak,  and  a  space 
His  soul  seemed  brooding  live  thoughts  beaked  with  fire. 
Hatching  them  into  words.     Upon  his  face 
There  glowed  the  light  of  truth's  divine  desire, 
Wherein  his  brows  did  heavenward  aspire, 
Like  wings  of  eagle  in  the  glow  of  morn. 
Anon  his  spirit  struck  the  full-toned  lyre 
Of  Mohawk  speech,  and  eloquence  was  born, 
Swaying  those  hearts  as  winds  of  summei*  sway  the  corn. 


XIII. 

"If  the  Great  Spirit  is  AUfather,  then, 
Keeukas !  to  the  whole  world  ye  are  kin — 
All  brothers  of  the  brotherhood  of  men, 
Of  the  same  blood  your  hands  would  dabble  in. 
Why  pant  ye  for  the  battle  to  begin  ? 
The  wolf,  the  panther  live  by  act  of  prey ; 
But  ye — but  what  do  ye  by  carnage  win  ? 
Eevenge !     What !  brother  for  slain  brother  slay  ? 
Such  vengeance  were  the  seed  of  slaughter  aye  and  aye. 


36  KEEUKA. 

XIY. 

Murder  is  mother  unto  murder ;  so, 
Thou  sachem  !  every  scalp  thy  warriors  take, 
Gets  them  at  least  one  other  deathful  foe, 
Whose  kindred  breast  shall  feverously  ache 
With  such  mad  thirst  as  naught  but  blood  can  slake : 
Each  heart  struck  cold,  makes  hot  a  hostile  hand ! 
Hence,  wrath's  fierce  billows  shall  still  ever  break 
Successive  on  the  shore  of  Spirit  Land, 
While  braves  against  braves  be  for  vengeful  warfare  clanned. 


XY. 

Bury  the  red  ax,  then !  go  not  to  battle ! 
No  rainbow  follows  fight's  wild  hurricane ; 
But  all  love's  bloom  is  blasted  where  the  rattle 
Of  arrowy  hail  melts  to  the  bloody  rain : 
The  ties  between  the  slayer  and  the  slain, 
In  being  severed,  rend  all  other  strings 
Of  the  live  heart's  affection-tangled  skein. 
Go  not  to  battle !  but  who  battle  brings 
Upon  your  home,  strike !  Justice  then  his  deathsong  sings. 


KEEUKA.  37 

V 

XVI. 

Such  godlike  speech  from  whom  they  deemed  divine, 
Wrought  quick  conversion  in  the  heroes'  breasts — 
Made  bright  bliss  in  the  women's  tearful  eyne  ; 
For  now  war's  furies  drop  their  snaky  crests, 
And  tamely  crawl  back  to  their  secret  nests. 
"New  truths  from  Spirit  Land!"  Moneeka  cried ; 
"Let  us  obey  their  beautiful  behests  !" 
By  throwing  down  their  arms,  the  braves  replied ; 
And  joy  thrilled  bosoms  that  had  just  with  sorrow  sighed. 


XVII. 

uln  sweet  peace,  then,  each  to  his  wigwam  go — 
In  time  love,  then,  and  lighten  woman's  toil ; 
Fix  him  a  home  where  nature's  beauties  grow, 
And,  better  far  than  brave  in  battle's  broil, 
Be  brave  in  labor,  victor  of  the  soil!" 
While  tongue  thus  utters,  forth  from  his  blue  ee 
Persuasion's  fascinating  folds  uncoil. 
They  each  obey;  and  soon  at  that  old  tree 
Are  left  none  save  Lelu  and  her  divine  Okkee. 


38    '  KEEUKA. 

XY1II. 

"Now,  while  Keeuka  holds  the  blushing  face 
Of  young  Morn  in  her  bosom,  and  the  note 
Of  lovelorn  turtle  fills  the  woody  place, 
Over  the  waters  in  our  cedarn  boat, 
O'er  the  blue  waters,  darling,  let  us  float; 
And,  as  the  ripple  from  the  curved  keel  slips 
With  silver  tinkle,  all  the  day  devote 
To  pleasant  converse,  till  soft  twilight  clips 
The  sunbeams,  leaving  in  the  stars  their  golden  tips." 


XIX. 

So  sweetly  had  addressed  he  sweet  Lelu, 
In  language  learned  from  Anglic  mother's  lips; 
For  well  the  pretty  squaw  its  meaning  knew, 
And  from  his  words  took  love  as  wild  bee  sips 
From  strange  blooms  honey ; — then,  the  black  eclipse 
Of  thick  hair  from  her  forehead  pushed  away, 
Passion's  quick  wings  touched  there  their  trembling  tips 
O  that  such  blisses  might  but  bide  for  aye ! 
Worth  thousand  common  ages  one  such  blissful  day. 


KEEUKA.  39 

XX. 

Ne'er  harpist  harping  with  his  golden  harp 
The  Orphic  miracles  of  raging  song, 
Could  half  sing  love — love's  rapture  keen  and  sharp, 
That  thrills  through  heart  and  each  hot  vein  along, 
A  pleasure-pain,  unspeakable  and  strong! 
Ye,  in  whose  bosoms  this  unresting  dove 
With  soft,  white  plumes,  yet  fierce  beak,  once  hath  clong, 
Ye  know  how  winged  words  far  it  soars  above, 
And  how  in  place  like  this,  love  must  be  doubly  love. 


XXI. 

The  woods'  wide  amphitheater  of  green ; 
The  sky's  high  overcanopy  of  blu6 ; 
The  lake,  arena  for  the  coming  scene 
Of  love's  boat  floating  with  its  dual  crew ; 
The  birds,  which,  as  they  sung,  and  singing  flew, 
And  flying  flashed  the  dewdrops,  one  might  deem 
Nature's  winged  halleluiahs ;  airs  that  blew 
Through  leafy  lips  aroma :  all  did  seem 
The  kingdom  come  of  passion's  paradisean  dream. 


40  KEEUKA. 

XXII. 

Just  where  the  green  made  border  to  the  blue, 
A  while  they  stood  in  silent  muse,  as  though, 
Of  all  the  glories  that  around  them  grew, 
That  arched  above,  that  liquid  lay  below, 
Into  their  soul  they  felt  the  essence  flow ; 
Into  their  soul ;  they  now  were  two  souls  one, 
Their  former  selves  love  had  commingled  so  : 
The  phases  of  life  opposite  were  done — 
As  sun  and  moon's  conjunction  leaves  naught  but  the  sun. 


XXIII. 

"Okkee ! — Bight  true,  thou  art  Okkee,  and  this 
Is  the  soul's  home.     For,  did  I  understand, 
Thou  said  that  love  is  spirit ;  then,  I  wis 
Enough  love  here  to  make  it  Spirit  Land. 
It  must  be  so  ;  for  fancy  never  planned 
For  hope  a  joy  more  blissful  in  that  realm — 
Is  it  not  all  a  dream  ?     Give  me  thy  hand : 
'Tis  real ! — Loose  the  prow  now  from  the  elm ; 
Sit  thou  and  talk  to  me,  Lelu  will  hold  the  helm." 


KEEUKA.  41 


XXIV. 

The  twain  embarked,  the  proa  swung  from  shore ; 
Few  strokes  of  dextrous  paddle  sent  it  clear. 
To  waft  away  where  breeze  soever  bore, 
Through  the  bright  concave  of  an  azure  sphere — 
Blue  sky  above,  blue  sky  beneath  the  mere. 
So  sphered  atween  the  two  skies  glode  the  bark 
Alone  and  still,  as  though  a  deluge  here 
Had  drowned  of  passion  every  vital  spark 
Save  only  love,  and  this  were  saved  love's  tiny  ark. 


XXY. 

Lelu  first  that  enraptured  silence  broke. 
"Thou  knowst  thou  promised  twice  twelve  moons  ago, 
That  when  I  learned  the  language  which  thou  spoke, 
I  should  the  story  of  thy  past  time  know: 
As  beautifully  as  the  blossoms  blow, 
Thy  words  hare  oped  their  meanings  in  my  mind, 
Till  well  I  comprehend  them  now,  I  trow ; 
So,  my  Okkee !  thy  thread  of  life  unwind, 
And  braid  it  up  with  strands  of  golden  talk  entwined." 


CANTO  III. 


i. 


"Mr  soul's  first  felt  stir  was  by  such  a  lake ; 
Memory  dawned  on  such  a  scene  of  blue  ; 
And  thence  have  waters  in  my  spirit's  make 
Grown  passions,  still  or  stormy,  ever  new : 
The  brook,  young  love,  meandrily  untrue  ; 
The  lake,  sweet  dream  of  poetry's  devotion ; 
The  river,  lust  of  fame,  which  greater  grew 
Forever  in  its  nearer  seaward  motion : 
Wild  muse  of  God's  infinity,  the  awful  ocean. 


KEEUKA.  43 


II. 


O !  I  have  always  loved  the  living  waters ; 
While  yet  a  very  child,  I  sought  the  brooks, 
And  wooed  them  as  Romance's  pretty  daughters, 
And  trysted  with  them  in  sequestered  nooks, 
And  gloated  on  them  with  most  passioned  looks, 
And  wived  them  to  my  soul,  and  hugged  them  there; 
The  crystal  pools  were  Fancy's  open  books, 
Where  ripply  fingers  of  the  poet  Air 
Wrote  roundelays  that  still  my  heart  doth  fondly  bear. 


III. 

In  noisy  flocks  while  other  children  played, 
Nurse  Nature  spread  her  lap  and  tended  me, 
And  so  before  me  her  delightments  laid 
That  I  was  charmed  to  sit  upon  her  knee, 
And  feel  my  heart  with  her  great  heart  agree : 
There  was  a  spirit  by  the  lake  and  river, 
Which  I  have  since  found  grander  by  the  sea, 
That  made  my  heartchords  with  a  transport  quiver, 
And  whispered,  Be  a  dreamer,  not  a  worldly  liver. 


44  KEEUKA. 


IV. 


That  whisper  to  my  life  became  a  fate  ; 
And  though  I  knew  naught  of  its  meaning  then. 
It  soon  was  taught  me  by  their  scorn  and  hate, 
Who  slave,  eat,  sleep — swarm,  sweat,  and  sleep  again, 
Moil,  cheat,  hoard,  strut  through  threescore  years  and  ten ; 
WTio  rise  the  scum  atop  the  heated  world, 
And  hide  pure  ore,  themselves  the  dross  of  men : 
The  lips  of  such,  contemptuous  pity  curled, 
And  at  the  worthless  boy  their  shafts  of  mock  were  hurled. 


V. 


And  even  parents  chid  me  for  a  drone — 
As  though  the  honey  for  life's  hive  were  wrought 
By  buzzers  only,  none  by  musers  lone ! 
As  though  it  better  were  to  gain  a  groat 
Than  win  from  nature  an  eternal  thought ! 
As  though  bright  truths  that  in  the  still  soul  spring 
Like  twilight  stars  in  heaven,  were  of  naught 
Because  they  have  not  the  metallic  ring ! 
As  though  man's  intellect  were  not  his  Godward  wing ! 


KEEUKA. 


VI. 

They  said  that  I  would  never  come  to  thrift, 
And  that  upon  the  sea  of  fortune  soon, 
Sailless  and  helmless,  I  would  be  adrift, 
Except  I  left  ygazing  on  the  moon, 
And  idly  dreaming  underneath  the  noon  ; 
That  who  would  clamber  honor's  toilsome  hight, 
His  feet  must  well  be  shod  with  silver  shoon, 
And  eye,  like  eagle's  in  the  sunward  flight, 
Kept  keen  and  steady  on  the  yellow-golden  light. 


VII. 

* 
And  so  I  hated  such  a  world  of  gold, 

And  turned  me  from  its  dazzle  to  the  hue 
More  mild  of  summer  woods,  of  skies  unrolled 
Above  them  grandly,  and  of  waters  blue. 
I  envied  every  bird  that  round  me  flew, 
Its  unreproved  delight,  and  longed  for  wings, 
To  seek  some  paradise  man  never  knew, 
Where  I  might  drink  all  pleasures  at  their  springs — 
Where  thoughts  were  honeybees  without  the  poison  stings. 


46  KEEUKA. 


I  mused  on  God's  world,  and  I  loved  to  live ; 
I  mused  on  man's,  and  I  desired  to  die: 
Power,  beauty,  majesty,  all  that  could  give 
The  soul  suggestion  of  its  nature  high, 
Were  lavished  here  to  prompt  it  to  the  sky ; 
And  yet  immortal  beings  wallowed,  ate, 
And  fattened,  like  the  creatures  of  the  sty — 
Ay,  scouted  him  with  grunts  of  brutish  hate, 
Who  dared  eschew  their  slough,  and  seek  a  nobler  fate. 


Such  was  my  early  estimate  of  men ; 

And  black  misanthropy  imbued  my  heart : 

And  yet  I  sighed  for  whom  to  love.     The  wren, 

The  robin,  whose  quick  wings  would  round  me  dart 

Among  the  thick  green  leaves,  were  each  a  part 

Of  passion's  duad ;  I,  I  was  a  self! 

With  no  sweet  lips  to  kiss  away  the  smart 

That  poverty  endures  of  vulgar  pelf; 

o  mate  with  me  to  delve  our  nature's  richest  delf. 


KEEUKA.  4ff 


X. 


I  went  to  school,  but  not  to  pore  on  books ; 
I  knew  to  read,  nor  sought  such  knowledge  more : 
I  went,  and  studied  love  in  woman's  looks, 
And  learned  by  heart  that  beautifulest  lore, 
And  conned  the  pleasant  lesson  o'er  and  o'er. 
Life  now  displayed  a  fuller,  fairer  phase 
Than  ever  it  had  shown  to  me  before ; 
For  lonesome  melancholy's  gloomy  haze 
Is  quick  dispelled  in  human  sympathy's  bright  rays. 


XI. 

The  schooldame  was  a  fair  and  gentle  creature, 
Whose  soul  seemed  chastened  by  some  sacred  wo, 
Which  had  stamped  angel  on  her  every  feature, 
And  made  her  accents  musically  low, 
As  when  soft  winds  through  lyre  Eolian  blow ; 
And  left  within  her  sad  and  holy  eyes 
The  passion  tears  just  ready  forth  to  flow ; 
And  given  to  her  such  a  spirit  guise 
As  had  small  need  of  change  to  fit  it  for  the  skies. 


4&  KEEUKA. 

XII. 

She  gently  forth  the  mind's  first  twinkles  brought 
As  gloamin  brings  the  stars — a  mother  mild 
(The  better  mother,  mother  of  its  thought) 
To  the  persuadable  and  plastic  child. 
In  love's  sweet  suasion  when  she  faintly  smiled, 
She  took  the  fond  heart  further  toward  the  land 
Where  life  is  love — where  is  no  anger  wild — 
Than  .all  devices  terror  ever  planned 
To  scare  man  heavenward  by  keeping  hellfire  fanned. 


XIII. 

She  was  not  old ;  and  yet  there  was  a  girl 
Just  in  the  first  teen — woman's  rosebud  year — 
That  called  her  mother — But  swift  memories  whirl 
Within  my  brain — forgive  me  if  the  tear 
Will  start,  Lelu — this  touches  me  so  near ! 
That  little  maid  who  called  the  schooldame  mother, 
At  once  filled  all  my  soul  as  sunrise  here 
Fills  all  yon  hollow  blue :  it  was  that  other, 
That  winged  affection,  past  the  chrysalid  of  brother. 


KEETJKA. 

XIY. 

.  And  though  she  called  me  brother,  yet  I  knew 
It  was  a  name  with  which  she  sought  to  hide 
Love  more  than  sisterly,  that  so  did  hue 
Her  being  with  its  rainbows  every  side, 
It  never  could  be  hidden  or  denied  : 
The  passion  panted  crimson  to  her  cheek, 
Like  summer  sundown  when  the  day  has  died, 
And  spoke  so  plainly  in  her  cadence  meek 
That  there  was  nothing  left  for  formal  words  to  speak. 


XT. 

And  so  no  formal,  jarring  words  were  spoken, 
To  mar  the  music  of  our  spirit  spheres ; 
No  promises  in  hope,  that  might  be  broken 
In  the  reality  of  after  years. 
But  there  were  thrills  that  cut  like  pain,  and  tears 
That  had  no  motive,  and  sad-seeming  sighs 
That  were  not  sorrowful,  and  doubts  and  fears 
Kerneled  with  secret  blisses,  and  soft  eyes 

That  held  the  deep  infinity  of  bluest  skies. 
5 


50  KEEUKA. 

XVI. 

The  mother  saw  our  burning  lives  thus  leaping 
Like  two  quick  flames  together,  and  she  knew 
That  hope  of  love's  beatitude  was  steeping 
Our  whole  existence  with  its  purple  hue ; 
Yet  not  displeased  was  she :  the  glistening  dew 
Of  holy  tenderness  her  blue  eyes  brimmed, 
As  looked  she  on  us,  and  believed  me  true, 
And  in  her  fond  anticipation  limned 
The  picture  of  our  oneness  ere  her  dirge  were  hymned. 


XVII. 

But  never  she  such  consummation  saw : 
The  shaft  of  sorrow,  which  had  stuck  so  long 
Deep  in  her  heart,  Death  gently  forth  did  draw, 
And  make  her  happy ;  and  he  did  not  wrong. 
But  there  were  those  to  whom  the  guilt  hath  cloiig 
Of  her  sad  lot,  and  shall  forever  cling ; 
Men  e'en  respectable  among  the  throng — 
Men  ?    Hellkites !  such  as  from  Abaddon  bring, 
And  over  earth  the  seeds  of  rank  damnation  fling. 


KEEUKA.  51 

XVIII. 

These  hucksters  of  hell  fury,  who  have  dens 
In  every  haunt,  and  bane  the  course  of  life 
From  Splendor's  palaces  to  Squalor's  pens — - 
Unparadise  fair  homes  with  fiendish  strife, 
And  stab  at  heaven  with  assassin's  knife — 
These  crossed  the  high  career  of  that  brave  youth 
Whom  she  had  wed,  and  from  the  bliss  of  wife 
Dejected  her  to  worse  than  widow's  ruth : 
He  was  a  brute  sot,  spoiled  of  manhood's  pride  and  truth. 


XIX. 

He  drank  himself  a  devil,  and  then  died ; 
And  at  his  wife  and  child  men  pointed  shame — 
Shame  to  be  mourners  of  state  homicide ! 
Shame  to  be  victims  of  black  crimes  that  claim 
The  sanction  of  the  law,  and  have  no  blame ! 
Great  God  !  the  blood  runs  like  a  sluice  of  fire 
Within  me,  as  I  contemplate  the  frame 
Of  civilization,  and  I  wish  a  lyre 
Of  thunder  power,  to  batter  it,  base,  dome,  and  spire! 


52  KEEUKA. 

XX. 

But  she  was  dead !  the  drunkard's  widow  now 
Lay  there  in  Heaven's  refuge,  past  all  scorn, 
The  euthanasy's  beauty  on  her  brow, 
As  though  she  dreamed  of  resurrection  morn, 
And  glimpsed  the  glory  of  the  second-born. — 
Oh !  blisses  must  be  infinite  on  high, 
To  number  out  the  tears  of  that  forlorn, 
Motherless  girl,  and  compensate  each  sigh : 
No  words  could  paint  her  wo ;  mine  may  not,  dare  not  try. 


XXI. 

The  sexton  smoothed  the  sod  above  the  dead, 
And  gently  then  they  bore  the  child  away, 
The  only  mourner,  though  hot  tears  were  shed 
Even  by  stern-browed  men  that  funeral  day. 
They  brought  the  sad  one  in  our  home  to  stay ; 
And  when  the  sob  had  settled  to  the  sigh, 
And  calm  submission  on  her  forehead  lay, 
"With  cheek  to  cheek,  beneath  the  evening  sky, 
Oft  would  we  sit,  and  muse  of  angels,  she  and  I. 


KEEUKA.  53 


XXII. 

And  at  such  times  the  stars  had  earnest  looks 
Of  sympathy,  as  though  each  held  a  tear; 
And  in  the  silvery  babble  of  the  brooks 
Almost  a  human  sobbing  we  could  hear ; 
Such  soft  wind- whispers  as  a  spirit's  fear 
Of  too  much  revelation  seemed  to  quell, 
Low  sibilated  solace  to  the  ear 
Of  sorrow ;  and  the  bulbuHn  the  dell, 
With  melody's  nepenthe  crowned  the  holy  spell. 


XXIII. 

So  passed  we  all  the  lovely  summer  eves, 
Our  souls  commingling  like  two  waterways 
Within  some  pleasant  valley  full  of  leaves : 
And  when  the  autumn  scarlet  gan  to  blaze 
Among  the  treetops,  and  the  mild,  warm  days, 
Like  watching  women,  softly  glided  round 
His  dying  bed,  as  though  they  strove  to  raise 
The  good  old  Year  up  from  his  dreamy  swound, 
New  brightness  her  blue  ee,  her  cheek  new  blushes  foun  1 , 


54  KEEUKA. 


XXIV. 

Then  through  the  glory  of  that  mellow  weather, 
We  traced  the  streams,  we  streamed  adown  the  glyn, 
And  clomb  atop  the  piny  hills  together  ; 
Nor  wist  we  aught  of  danger  we  were  in, 
For  neither  one  was  ware  of  any  sin : 
We  leaned  our  foreheads  o'er  the  selfsame  book, 
Along  which  some  immortal  mind  had  been, 
And,  mingling  with  our  mingled  spirits,  took 
Its  power  in,  as  this  lake  bosoms  yonder  brook. 


XXY. 

The  trees  put  on  their  ghostly  robes  of  snow 
At  length,  and  we — But  how  that  winter  time 
We  passed,  beside  the  hearthstone's  cheery  glow, 
Edened  in  young  love's  always-summer  clime — 
And  how,  too,  in  the  next  year's  bloomy  prime, 
We  told  with  flowers  what  ne  we  dared  with  tongue — 
Then  summer  through,  and  all  the  fall  sublime, 
How  clung  our  hearts,  and  close  and  closer  clung — 
Pangs  to  remember :  be  it  to  oblivion  flung ! 


KEEUKA.  55 


XXYI. 

Two  years  had  passed,  and  we  were  not  the  same, 
Though  same  in  age :  she  was  a  woman  now, 
I  yet  a  boy.     Still  with  a  lip  of  flame 
She  breathed  me  burning  words,  and  sealed  her  vow 
Of  truth  on  blushing  cheek  and  beating  brow. 
But  by  and  by  an  other  came  to  woo 
That  loveliness  to  which  my  heart  did  bow 
As  does  the  Hindoo  unto  his  Gooroo ; 
And  he  was  all  a  stranger,  none  knew  whence  or  who. 


XXVII. 

But  it  was  said  that  some  illustrious  hero 
Of  bygone  ages  mythically  dim, 
(Some  Cesar  great — or  haply  e'en  some  Nero !) 
By  deeds  immortal  had  ennobled  him, 
And  him  enriched  with  coffers  full  to  brim. 
Besides  nobility,  he  had  a  mien 
Of  winningness,  with  person  tall  and  trim, 
And  tongue  possessed  of  power  almost  to  wean 
Angels  from  heaven  unto  hell's  eternal  threne. 


56  KEEUKA. 


XXVIII. 

Then  Jessie  grew  so  sisterly  to  me — 
So  friendly-calm  to  me  so  passion-tossed  ! — 
And  blushed  so  bashful  to  the  stranger's  ee, 
I  knew  in  heart  love's  paradise  was  lost : 
Between  me  and  hope's  life-tree  cherubs  crossed 
Their  flaming  swords  ;  the  night  of  cold  despair 
Came  down  with  darkness  and  with  deadly  frost 
Upon  my  spirit's  blowth,  and  withered  there 
All  that  was  beautiful,  all  that  was  flushly  fair. 


XXIX. 

I  saw  them  wedded — ay,  stood  nigh  the  altar, 
And  froze  my  tears  down  'neath  an  icy  pride, 
While  in  a  voice  that  never  seemed  to  falter, 
She  spoke  herself  away,  an  other's  bride. 
I  wished  her  joy  then,  and  with  haughty  stride — 
So  haughty  it  betrayed  my  humbled  heart — 
I  hurried  home,  and  there,  alone,  untied 
My  heartstrings  loose  to  anguish.     With  a  start 
I  rose  and  manned  myself :  forthwith  I  must  depart. 


KEEUKA.  57 


XXX. 

With  tears  that  blurred  and  blinded,  and  with  words 
Of  long  farewell,  I  parted  from  the  spot 
Where  land,  lake,  sky,  where  woods,  and  brooks,  and  birds, 
All  minded  me  what  better  were  forgot. 
I  can  not  think  it  is  a  mournful  lot, 
To  leave  the  scene  where  love  has  died,  for  aye, 
To  quit  the  home  where  sympathy  is  not, 
Where  all  bids  go,  and  naught  invites  to  stay : 
It  is  as  if  relief,  to  wander  thence  away. 


CANTO  IV. 
i. 

"A WAY  !  away !     My  swarming  thoughts  had  stings 
That  pricked  me  madly  onward,  and  my  feet, 
To  give  them  fleetness,  took  on  dead  Love's  wings : 
Away !  away !  with  heart  of  bursting  beat — 
Away !  away  !  no  matter  what  to  meet. 
Not  till  the  stars  of  nightfall  had  already 
Flocked  to  their  places,  and  their  magic  sweet 
Shed  on  me,  did  my  brain's  wild  torrent  eddy 
To  consciousness,  and  flow  in  reason's  current  steady. 


KEEUKA.  59 


II. 


I  startled  at  the  newness  of  the  scenes ; 
Thought  of  my  plight  struck  like  a  stab  of  steel 
A  youth  just  past  the  midway  of  my  teens, 
Unschooled  in  life,  unbacked  by  golden  weal — 
Nor  tact  nor  taste  to  tug  at  fortune's  wheel, 
Nor  robe  of  ancestry  my  name  to  don, 
And  naught  on  earth  save  heart  to  virtue  leal ! 
But  such  concern  was  not  for  me  to  con  : 
What  was  the  future  worth  ? — I  sternly  strided  on. 


III. 


All  through  that  night  the  farmhouse  bandogs  bayed  me, 
And  ghosts  that  stories  told  to  childhood  raised, 
Stole  out  from  gloomy  corners,  and  waylaid  me ; 
But  still  I  took  one  star,  and  on  it  gazed, 
And  followed  it,  till  kindling  morning  blazed 
On  glary  domes  and  flashing  steeples  high, 
And  art's  magnificence  my  dim  eyes  dazed : 
I  found  myself  a  mighty  city  nigh, 
Whose  matin  hymn  to  Mammon  gan  to  din  the  sky. 


60  KEBUKA. 

IY. 

As  one  that  stands  upon  a  wreck,  and  feels, 
Before  he  plunges  in  the  horrid  deep, 
A  mortal  shudder,  and  with  faintness  reels, 
So  I  above  that  city  on  the  steep 
Stood  dreading,  as  though  death  were  in  the  sweep 
Of  the  great  human  billows  there  that  rolled 
With  roar  of  action,  and  with  surge  and  leap 
Forever  dashed  upon  a  strand  of  gold : 
But  so  I  stood  not  long ; — despair  had  made  me  bold. 


Y. 


I  pressed  on,  and  was  quickly  swallowed  in 
By  that  life-Maelstrom,  and  my  selfhood  drowned 
In  its  abysmalness.     The  pomp,  the  din 
Whirled  me  in  wilderment,  and  struck  me  stound 
I  wandered  through  the  streets,  and  gazed  around 
Upon  the  spectacle  so  strange  to  me — 
The  wonders  of  the  new  world  I  had  found — 
The  stormy  motions  of  a  living  sea, 
Where  virtue's  ripples  low  and  sin's  high  surges  be. 


KEETJKA. 


VI. 


My  spent  soul  swum  ;  the  whirlpool  narrowing  round  me, 
Sucked  to  the  center  in  a  swoon  at  last, 
Wherein  I  sunk,  and  deep  oblivion  drowned  me. 
When  the  inanity  of  that  swoon  passed, 
I  seemed  as  from  a  booming  ocean  cast 
Upon  a  silent  shore :  I  lay  alone, 
Till  soon  an  old  man's  forehead,  grandly  vast, 
Hung  o'er  me  like  a  moon ; — that  old  man's  tone 
Was  thunder  set  to  tune  and  muffled  to  a  moan. 


VII. 

In  accents  that  were  full  of  soothing  pleasance — 
Though  every  word  was  ponderous  with  thought 
And  with  the  weight  of  his  majestic  presence — 
He  said  that  Heaven  had  one  blessing  brought 
To  recompense  a  life  with  sorrows  fraught, 
In  giving  me  to  him  ;  that  I  should  stay 
In  his  home  thenceforth  always,  and  that  naught 
Should  sever  us  till  Death  his  sythe  should  sway, 
And  mow  the  mortal  bonds  of  sympathy  away. 


KEEUKA 


VIII. 

With  words,  and  kindnesses  that  have  no  words, 
That  old  man  cheered  and  cherished  me,  his  son 
By  heart's  adoption :  solace  such  as  girds 
"Wo's  zenith  with  a  blue  horizon,  run 
Through  all  his  act,  and  on  my  spirit  won 
As  clear  sky  wins  upon  a  passing  storm. 
The  passion  chaos  of  my  life  was  done, 
The  vague  infinitudes  began  to  swarm 
Concrete,  and  orbs  of  thought  to  gather  into  form. 


IX. 


My  fosterfather  was  a  great  savan, 
Versed  in  the  sciences  of  ancient  years, 
And  in  the  histories  of  ancient  man  ; 
His  large  mind  shepherded  the  nocking  spheres 
Upon  the  plains  of  heaven  ;  rapt  to  tears, 
He  drank  thought's  written  immortalities 
From  rare  old  words  that  have  not  charmed  the  ears 
Of  men  for  decades  of  long  centuries  : 
And  me  he  pointed  where  the  truth  of  greatness  is. 


KEEUKA. 


X. 


I  followed  earnestly ;  for  thus  I  hoped 
To  distance  memory  and  fly  regret : 
Mine  eyes  the  starry  eyes  of  night  outcoped 
In  steadiness  of  vigilance,  and  met 
The  gaze  of  Lucifer  at  morn,  to  get 
The  pearls  of  knowledge  from  the  depths  of  toil, 
And  in  my  crown  of  life  their  beauty  set ; 
Nor  weariness  could  aught  my  ardor  foil, 
As  toward  the  Central  Soul  I  circled,  coil  by  coil. 


XI. 

The  languages  in  which  old  glory  lives ; 
The  once-dim  truths  that  genius  has  brought  nigh, 
As  telescope  the  stars ;  the  power  that  gives 
To  lettered  speech  such  forms  as  never  die : 
I  studied  these,  and  studied  too  the  why 
Of  man's  existence,  and  nigh  crazed  my  brain 
With  God's  great  mysteries,  as  toward  the  sky 
My  soul  leaped  up  like  wild  beast  in  the  chain, 
And  tore  itself  and  raved  in  ignorailce's  pain. 


64:  KEEUKA. 

XII. 

Years  passed  like  dreams — for  we  were  not  a  part 
Of  the  world's  wakeful  stir — divinest  dreams, 
Of  poetry,  philosophy,  and  art, 
And  liberty,  and  glory,  and  all  themes 
Of  thought ;  the  stars,  those  everlasting  gleams 
Of  God  in  heaven ;  life,  this  endless  chase 
Of  childhood  after  rainbows ;  death,  which  seems 
The  lifting  of  the  vail  from  Mystery's  face ; 
And  immortality  in  some  more  happy  place. 


XIII. 

So  passed  the  years ;  and  I,  now  grown  a  man, 
Grew  full  of  manhood's  righteous  hate  of  wrong. 
I  saw  my  country's  freedom  under  ban ; 
I  saw  the  weak  down  trodden  by  the  strong ; 
I  saw  Toil's  slavery,  which  had  so  long 
Been  sanctioned  by  the  horror  of  starvation ; 
And  from  my  fiery  heart  I  hurled  a  song 
That  struck  against  the  great  heart  of  the  nation. 
And  won  the  people's  praise,  the  rulers'  execration. 


KEEUKA.  65 

XIV. 

The  trained  hounds  of  the  law  were  let  the  slip, 
And  put  on  track.     One  morning,  as  I  woke, 
The  old  man,  with  his  finger  on  his  lip, 
Stole  to  me  in  my  closet ;  ere  he  spoke, 
A  saber  felled  him  with  a  mortal  stroke 
Dealt  from  behind,  and  over  me  outpoured 
His  warm  blood — Christ !  how  then  my  fury  broke 
From  reason's  leash !  I  snatched  the  smoking  sword, 
And  with  one  horrid  plunge  the  murderer's  bosom  gored. 


XY. 

God!  'twas  the  spoiler  of  my  boyhood's  love! 
The  spouse  of  Jessie !  slayer  of  my  sire ! 
He  had  twice  murdered  me ! — I  stood  above 
His  body,  and,  with  thews  like  steely  wire, 
Brandished  the  bloody  blade,  and  dared  the  ire 
Of  twenty  soldiers  that  had  followed  there. 
They  pressed  upon  me,  and  their  curses  dire 
And  clang  of  metal  made  the  people  ware ; 

Who  then  came  bursting  in,  with  eyes  of  desperate  glare. 
6 


66  KEEUKA. 

XYI. 

\ 

They  saw  the  old  man  they  had  loved  so  long, 
Prostrate,  his  gray  hair  mopping  in  his  gore ; 
They  saw  me  who  had  dared  to  sing  the  song 
Of  liberty,  encompassed  by  a  score 
Of  swordmen ;  and  they  paused  to  see  no  more, 
But  rushed  right  on.     Oh !  then  thick  horrors  rose 
And  scuffled  there  with  bloody  death ! — the  roar, 
The  shock,  the  clash,  the  stab,  the  deadly  close, 
All  sounds,  all  sights  that  fight's  infernal  fury  knows ! 


XYII. 

* 

I  did  my  part  for  freedom  in  that  fray ; 
I  fought  for  life  as  manhood  prompted  me — 
Nay,  fought  for  what  the  brave  throw  life  away, 
The  right  to  speak,  to  think,  to  act,  to  be — 
To  be!  for  what  is  being,  if  not  free? 

•  The  frightful  struggle  thickened,  and  the  ring 
Of  combat  narrowed  round,  till  in  that  sea 
Of  bloodshed,  underneath  the  two-hand  swing 

Of  some  huge  weapon  I  went  down,  a  senseless  thing. 


KEEUKA.  67 

«* 

XYIII. 

How  long  I  lay,  I  know  not ;  when  I  woke, 
A  Seabreeze,  blabbing  of  the  billows,  swayed 
My  hair  back  like  a  fond  hand's  gentle  stroke, 
And,  smacking  kisses  on  my  temples,  played 
The  dallying  lover.     Then  a  simple  maid 
With  smooth  brown  hair  and  bashful  hazel  eyes, 
Stooped  o'er  my  bed,  and  on  my  forehead  laid 
Her  soft  hand.     How  her  sympathizing  sighs 
Changed  as  she  looked  upon  me — changed  to  joyful  cries ! 


XIX. 

My  reason  had  returned !     There  crowded  round, 
With  gratulation,  men  to  tears  elated, 
Men  on  whose  fronts  King  Toil  had  full  embrowned 
The  stamp  of  true  nobility,  narrated 
Never  in  heraldry,  but  elevated 
Above  the  majesties  of  all  the  earth : 
The  Labor  Lords,  the  rank  by  God  created ! 
The  Labor  Lords,  emblazoned  by  their  worth! 
I  pride  me  that  from  this  old  line  I  took  my  birth. 


KEEUKA. 


XX. 

I  should  have  thought  that  I  had  been  in  slumber, 
And  dreamed  those  horrors,  but  my  arm  I  raised, 
And  found  it  shrunk  with  days  of  weary  number, 
Spent  in  such  fever  as  had  racked  and  crazed. 
But  health  came  slowly  back,  and  glad  eyes  gazed 
Solicitous,  as  though  a  noise  or  motion 
Imperiled  me ;  and  low,  vague  hints  were  phrased' 
Of  danger  of  the  law,  of  stern  devotion 
To  me  to  th'  death,  and  of  a  flight  beyond  the  ocean. 


XXI. 

I  knew  the  state  sought  me  as  murderer ; 
And  so,  before  its  vengeance  tracked  me  there, 
And  with  me  them  involved,  who  would  incur 
The  risk  of  blood  in  my  defense,  and  share 
The  gibbet  with  me,  I  resolved  to  dare 
The  world  alone.     One  morning  at  the  light, 
Ere  my  preservers  were  awake  or  ware, 
I  stole  from  them,  and  where  the  sea's  wings  white 
Flocked  the  near  harbor,  thitherward  I  took  my  flight. 


KEEUKA 


XXII. 

Down  in  the  fog,  beside  the  gloomy  river, 
Three  men  stood  round  a  corpse — some  mortal  who 
Had  spurned  the  gift  of  life  back  to  the  Giver- 
Had  rent  the  vail  between  the  worlds  in  two, 
And  with  bold  sacrilege  burst  madly  through. 
It  was  a  woman's  form,  a  lovely  bust 
And  round  limbs  that  the  wet  robe  seemed  to  woo 
Embracingly,  as  conscious  of  the  trust 
Of  loveliness  it  folded!— Oh!  was  Heaven  just! 


XXIII. 

Was  there  a  God  that  ruled  the  right  and  wrong! 
That  suicide  was  Jessie !     How  my  soul 
Staggered  with  agony !     There  was  the  strong, 
The  wild  despair  of  love,  as  on  a  scroll, 
Writ  on  her  forehead ;  years  and  years  of  dole 
That  has  no  word,  showed  in  her  thin,  pale  cheek  ;- 
We  raised  her,  and  from  next  her  heart  out  stole 
His  likeness,  who  had  crushed  that  heart  so  meek: 
How  eloquent  of  woman's  fondness  did  it  speak ! 


70  KEEUKA. 


XXIY. 

And  there  were  letters  in  her  bosom  hid, 
Deathwarrants  in  his  writing !     I  was  glad 
That  my  quick  vengeance  stabbed  him  as  it  did. 
I  put  poor  Jessie  in  the  grave,  and  had 
Her  name  in  marble  and  a  willow  sad 
Placed  over  her,  and  left  her  to  her  rest. 
With  civilization  now  my  brain  was  mad ; 
With  this  last  horror,  hell  burned  in  my  breast: 
I  blessed  the  prow  that  pointed  toward  the  savage  west. 


XXV. 

I  took  the  deck,  and  as  the  rushing  keel 
Furrowed  the  field  of  waters,  and  the  sail 
Strained  bellying  toward  America,  my  zeal 
For  freedom  greatened  with  the  westward  gale. 
So  shall  it  be  in  time  hence,  when  the  stale 
And  doted  polities  of  olden  time 
Shall  obsolesce  in  man's  regard,  and  fail 
Of  his  devotion:  liberty  sublime 
Shall  strengthen  with  the  wind  which  wafts  it  to  this  clime. 


KEEUKA. 


XXVI. 

O  Liberty  !  thy  symbol  is  the  sea  , 
The  great  sea  is  thy  symbol,  and  the  waves 
Which  roll  before  the  east  wind,  emblem  thee  ; 
Thou  hast  a  motion  like  them  :  westward  raves 
The  wild  storm  of  oppression,  till  the  caves 
Of  awful  truth  be  stirred  ;  and  grandly  then 
Thou  shalt  rise  up,  and  heave  them  to  their  graves, 
Who  brave  thy  tempest  —  tyrants  over  men, 
Ingulfed  in  Revolution,  ne'er  to  rise  again! 


XXYII. 

But  what  thoughts  the  sublimity  of  ocean 
Stirred  in  me,  I  have  told  thee  long  ago, 
Or  tried  to  tell  thee — for  there  is  emotion 
Upon  the  wide  sea,  that  no  words  can  show 
The  shadow  of; — and  told  thee  what  a  glow 
I  felt  to  make  this  free  land ;  and  before, 
Thou  knowst  that  I  had  told  thee  of  my  slow 
Long  wanderings  till  I  reached  Keeuka's  shore, 
And  how  at  last  I  found  thee,  darling  evermore!" 


CANTO  Y. 
i. 

STILL  sat  she  in  the  trance  of  listening, 
And  he  stooped  o'er  to  kiss  her  from  her  dream. 
The  sun  aslope  had  now  begun  to  fling 
The  trees'  cool  shadows  on  the  lake,  and  stream 
Down  through  the  leaves  in  many  a  wavering  gleam 
Upon  the  water,  as  in  sweet  embrace, 
And  the  low  speech  of  passion  that  did  beam 
So  holily  upon  each  earnest  face, 
They  glode  on  toward  love's  home — life's  heavenliest  place ! 


KEEUKA.  73 


II. 


Then  through  the  long,  dark  archway  wafted  they, 
Till  far  within,  a  golden  stream  of  light, 
Which  down  through  cleft  of  granite  flowed  from  day, 
Showed  them  their  grottoed  home :  of  lofty  hight 
The  spacious  chamber,  and  the  walls  bedight 
With  graceful  tapestry  of  painted  pelt ; 
And  there  were  seats,  and  couch,  and  books  in  sight — 
Dear  books,  wherein  Lelu  had  often  spelt 
Her  way  to  glorious  thoughts .    How  happy  here  they  dwelt ! 


III. 

Here  wellnigh  three  years  had  they  passed  the  days — 
Herd  and  along  the  lake's  most  hidden  nooks — 
Learning  each  other's  language,  how  to  phrase 
In  fittest  words  love's  eloquence  of  looks ; 
And  she  had  got  the  magic  of  his  books 
Shut  in  her  soul,  and  he  of  her  sweet  lips 
The  music,  sweeter  than  the  flow  of  brooks : 
So  passed  the  days  in  fond  companionships, 

But  parted  always  at  the  gloamin's  first  eclipse. 

7 


74-  KEEUKA. 

IV. 

So  passed  the  days  of  love's  eternity ; 
So  ebbed  and  flowed  beneath  the  passion-moon; 
So  went,  and  left  themselves  a  memory 
Like  "gratitude  for  some  most  precious  boon: 
The  dreamful  night,  glad  morn,  delightsome  noon, 
Chased  in  swift  circle,  staggering  with  bliss — 
Blest  circle,  save  that  night  came  round  too  soon, 
And  brought  the  sweet  pain  of  the  parting  kiss, 
And  morn,  that  brought  the  kiss  of  greeting,  too  remiss. 


V. 


They  parted  now,  to  meet  again  at  morn ; 
One  long  kiss,  and  her  bark  went  darting  out 
Into  the  lake,  and  he  again  was  lorn. 
His  supper  finished  of  the  golden  trout. 
He  hears  the  echoes  of  the  well-known  shout 
That  welcomes  home  Lelu's  boat  every  eve. 
He  sleeps;  he  wakes;  red  dawn  begins  to  flout 
The  stars  ;  the  quick  strokes  of  her  paddle  cleave 
The  water :  once  more  tears  and  smiles  love's  rainbow  weave. 


KEEUKA. 


VI. 


Thus  early  to  the  grot  had  come  Lelu, 
With  terror  in  her  voice  and  in  her  eye, 
Relating  that  the  Mohawks  were  in  view 
Upon  the  mountain,  and  their  battlecry 
Was,  Death  to  the  Keeukas !  they  must  die ! 
For  they  are  traitors  to  the  Mingo  name ! 
"To  boat!  to  boat!  Okkee,  and  let  us  fly 
To  council,  and  enkindle  valor's  flame 
In  hearts  whose  blood  today  must  wash  away  this  shame!" 


VII. 

He  seized  his  gun,  and  charged  it  with  the  death — 
A.  long,  white  mantle  on  his  shoulder  flung, 
And  took  the  boat ;  the  passing  of  a  breath, 
And  out  upon  the  lake  the  vessel  swung ; 
Then,  every  nerve  with  strong  exertion  strung, 
To  the  other  shore  it  flew  like  frightened  bird : 
A  moment  more,  and  stood  Okkee  among 
The  throng  of  braves,  and  gave  his  hot  thought  word, 
Which  lit  their  souls  like  flame  by  breath  of  fierce  wind  stirred, 


76  KEEUKA. 


VIII. 

"Who  fights  for  his  dear  home  and  for  his  life, 
Him  the  Great  Spirit's  truth  shall  justify ; 
Who  falls  defending  from  vile  wrong  his  wife 
And  children,  shall  be  blest  in  yonder  sky. 
Keeukas !  your  sworn  deadly  foes  are  nigh ; 
They  come  down  like  the  thunder-tempest  sweep: 
It  is  your  duty,  meet  them  though  ye  die 
At  the  first  onslaught !  let  your  keen  points  leap 
Eight  to  the  death!     The  brave  sink  not  alone  to  sleep." 


IX. 


No  plaudit  followed ;  desperation's  hush 
Held  back  their  breath ;  but  as  a  thundercloud 
Takes  shifting  shapes  of  horror  ere  the  rush 
And  roar  of  rain,  so  shaped  that  little  crowd 
Its  phalanx  for  the  storm  of  battle  loud. 
Moneeka  stood  the  center  of  the  van, 
And  on  "his  forehead  sat  death  glory-browed: 
His  eye  along  his  banded  warriors  ran ; 
The  thrill  of  that  stern  glance  went  through  them,  man  by  man. 


KEEUKA.  77 


X. 


Down  swept  the  fierce  Five  Nations  like  a  torrent, 
Firm  stood  the  clan  Keeuka  like  a  rock — 
Down  swept  with  bows  and  flinted  arrows  horrent, 
Firm  stood  with  warknives,  stirless  as  a  stock, 
Stiiiess  as  death,  yet  ready  for  the  shock. 
The  hurricane  of  arrows  strikes  them ;  still, 
Stirless  as  death,  they  wait  to  interlock 
The  grapple  of  the  fight  that  is  to  kill: 
Each  hot  heart  there  had  froze  to  that  one  icy  will. 


XI. 

The  mad  assailants  thrust  aback  their  bows, 
And  with  a  yell  that  stunned  the  echoes  dead, 
And  with  raised  tomahawks,  rushed  to  the  close : 
A  quick,  sharp  roar  burst  forth  unwont  and  dread- 
The  Mohawk  chieftain  bit  the  dust  and  bled ! 
Out  strode  Okkee,  clad  in  his  cloak  of  white, 
And  the  Five  Nations  cast  their  arms  and  fled 
In  disarrayed  and  wild  disordered  flight; 
While  the  Keeukas  gazed  in  superstitious  fright. 


78  KEEUKA. 

XII. 

Out  from  their  covert  flocked  the  women  glad. 
But  glad  not  long ;  Moneeka  fainting  fell : 
Two  arrowheads  sunk  in  his  vitals,  had, 
From  the  first  onset,  drained  his  lifeblood  well. 
All  press  around  him — bear  him  to  the  dell 
Where  wells  a  cool  spring ;  there  to  his  last  sleep 
Lelu's  love  rocks  him  on  the  sobbing  swell 
Of  her  soft  bosom,  while  with  anguish  deep — 
Okkee  his  forehead  bathing — loud  his  people  weep. 


XIII. 

"Okkee !  I  feel  thy  hand  like  flesh  and  blood! 
Thou  art  not  spirit !     Thou  wilt  be  my  son ! 
The  spouse  of   my  Lelu !     Ere  next  spring  bud 
Upon  my  grave,  let  wedlock  make  ye  one  ! — 
My  people,  lo,  your  sachem  ! — I  have  ran 
My  race — and  I — would — rest  now" — Sunk  his  head, 
And  gasped  his  breath :  Moneeka's  life  was  done. — 
Him  and  the  Mohawk  laid  they  in  one  bed, 
While  hot  tears  over  them  sincerest  sorrow  shed. 


KEEUKA.  79 

XIY. 

"The  champion  of  the  right,  and  of  the  wrong — 
The  hero  of  revenge,  and  of  defense — 
Lie  side  by  side  here  in  the  slumber  long, 
Till  the  Great  Spirit's  voice  shall  call  them  hence, 
And  all  their  truth  and  error  recompense : 
So  death  has  bid  their  causeless  quarrel  cease, 
And  brought  them  friends  before  Omnipotence. 
What  prompture  this  to  living  love's  increase ! 
Why  should  life  be  a  war,  since  death  is  such  a  peace ! 


XV. 

Keeukas !  if  I  be  your  chosen  chief, 
Kevenge  must  all  be  buried  in  this  grave ; 
Let  peace  put  forth  to  blossom,  and  in  leaf 
Let  love's  flush  beauty  o'er  ye  always  wave ! 
Live  here,  and  till  the  soil  your  fathers  gave  ! 
Cling  to  your  homes  here  in  the  gloom  of  green ! 
Lelu  and  I  dwell  still  in  Spirit  Cave, 
And  meet  to  mingle  with  ye  morn  and  e'en — 
They  in  the  home  of  souls  less  blest  than  we,  I  ween  I" 


80  KEEUKA. 

XYI. 

If 
Okkee  had  said ;  and  all  in  circle  ringing, 

Round  him  they  danced,  round  him  and  his  Lelu, 
Round  them  they  danced,  in  chorus  gladly  singing  ; 
Till  toward  his  bloody  doom  the  spent  sun  drew, 
And  lengthening  on  the  lake  the  shadows  grew. — 
She  half  with  love  and  half  with  sorrow  sighed, 
As  round  her  zone  his  arm  he  gently  threw, 
And  lifting  her  to  boat,  the  paddle  plied — 
And  o'er  Keeuka  glode  the  Chieftain  and  his  Bride. 


NOTES  TO  KEEUKA. 


CANTO   I. 
i. 

Enough,  that  truer  Mingoes  never  drew 
An  arrow  to  the  head,  or  twanged  a  bow. 

STANZA.  XI,  LINK  6. 

The  Five  Nations  consisted  originally,  or  when  first  known  to  Europeans, 
of  the  Mohawks,  the  Oneidas,  the  Cayugas,  the  Onondagas,  and  the  Sen- 
ecas.  Among  the  French  they  had  the  appellation  of  Iroquois ;  among  the 
Dutch,  that  of  Maquas ;  but  by  the  Indians  of  Virginia  they  were  gener- 
ally called  Massawomekes;  and  by  themselves,  Mingoes.  MC!NTOSH. 

2. 

And  from  the  mighty  Mohawk  sagamore. 

STANZA  XII,  LINK  1. 

The  Mohawks  were  the  head  of  the  Five  Nations ;  and  the  whole  con- 
federacy was  frequently  known  by  that  name.  The  grand  sachem,  or  saga- 
more, belonged  to  the  ancient  and  original  stock,  from  which  the  rest  were 
said  to  be  descended.  To  him  all  the  inferior  chiefs  of  the  subordinate 
tribes  were  subject.  MO!NTOSH. 


82  NOTES    TO    KEEUKA. 

3. 

Rise !  Mingoes,  rise !  your  Agresquee  invoke. 

STANZA.  XII,  LINK  8. 

II  parait  que  dans  ces  chansons  (de  guerre)  on  invoque  le  Dieu  de  la 
Guerre,  que  les  Hurons  appellent  Areskoui,  et  les  Iroquois,  Agreskoui. 

CHARLEVOIX. 

4. 

The  Mohawk  leads  the  Nations  Triple-Clanned. 

STANZA  XVI,  LINE  5. 

Each  of  these  Nations  is  divided  into  three  tribes,  or  families,  who  dis- 
tinguish themselves  by  three  different  names,  or  ensigns — the  Tortoise,  the 
Bear,  and  the  "Wolf.  LORD  CADWALLADER  GOLDEN. 

5. 

Him  hoarsely  grunted  guttural  applause. 

STANZA  XVIII,  LINE  2. 

Instead  of  acclamation,  the  Indians  manifest  their  approbation  by  a 
hoarse,  guttural  grunt. 

6. 

Uttered  a  low,  wild  chant,  unstopped  by  lip. 

STANZA  XX,  LINE  8. 

The  Mohawk  language,  which  is  the  language  of  the  Five  Nations,  is 
wholly  destitute  of  labials,  or  has  no  words  whioh  require  the  lips  to  be 
closed  in  pronouncing  them.  MC!NTOSH. 


CANTO   H. 
I. 

Should  leave  their  bodies  cold  and  breathless  things 

In  far  lands,  clawed  by  wolves,  and  flapped  by  ravens'  wings ! 

STANZA  V,  LINES  8,  9. 

What  shall  he  be  ere  night  ?    Perchance  a  thing 
O'er  which  the  raven  flaps  her  funeral  wing. 

BYRON'S  CORSAIE. 


NOTES    TO  KEEUKA.  83 

2. 

Sire,  the  Great  Spirit  my  Okkee  hath  sent. 

STANZA  X,  LINK  8. 

The  religion  of  the  Indians  is  eminently  polytheistic,  recognizing  one 
supreme  god,  whom  they  call  the  Great  Spirit,  one  next  inferior  deity,  who 
is  accounted  evil,  and  an  infinite  number  of  lower  divinities,  who,  they 
suppose,  pervade  and  animate  all  nature.  These  latter  they  distribute  into 
two  classes ;  the  good  and  the  evil.  The  good  are  guardian  spirits ;  and 
by  one  of  them  every  individual,  from  birth  to  death,  is  believed  to  be  con- 
stantly attended.  Of  these  tutelar  deities  each  has  a  peculiar  form : 
sometimes  it  is  that  of  a  bird ;  sometimes  of  a  fish ;  a  beast  of  prey ;  a 
human  being.  According  to  Charlevoix,  the  Algonquins  style  these  spirits 
Manitous  ;  the  Hurons,  Okkis,  or,  in  English  orthography,  Okkees. 


POEMS. 


KAIN    ON   THE   KOOF. 

WHEN  the  humid  shadows  hover 

Over  all  the  starry  spheres,  * 
And  the  melancholy  darkness 

Gently  weeps  in  rainy  tears, 
'Tis  a  joy  to  press  the  pillow 

Of  a  cottage-chamber  bed, 
And  to  listen  to  the  patter 

Of  the  soft  rain  overhead. 


Every  tinkle  on  the  shingles 
Has  an  echo  in  the  heart ; 

And  a  thousand  dreamy  fancies 
Into  busy  being  start, 


88  RAIN   ON    THE  ROOF. 

0 

And  a  thousand  recollections 
Weave  their  bright  hues  into  woof, 

As  I  listen  to  the  patter 
Of  the  rain  upon  the  roof. 


Now  in  fancy  comes  my  mother, 

As  she  used  to,  years  agone, 
To  survey  her  darling  dreamers, 

Ere  she  left  them  till  the  dawn; 
O !  I  see  her  bending  o'er  me, 

As  I  list  to  this  refrain 
Which  is  played  upon  the  shingles 

By  the  patter  of  the  rain. 


Then  my  little  seraph  sister, 

With  her  wings  and  waving  hair, 
And  her  bright-eyed  cherub  brother — 

A  serene,  angelic  pair ! — 
Glide  around  my  wakeful  pillow, 

With  their  praise  or  mild  reproof, 
As  I  listen  to  the  murmur 

Of  the  soft  rain  on  the  roof. 


BAIN    ON    THE  ROOF. 

And  an  other  comes  to  thrill  me 

With  her  eye's  delicious  blue ; 
And  forget  I,  gazing  on  her, 

That  her  heart  was  all  untrue: 
I  remember  but  to  love  her 

"With  a  rapture  kin  to  pain, 
And  my  heart's  quick  pulses  vibrate 

To  the  patter  of  the  rain. 


There  is  naught  in  Art's  bravuras, 
That  can  work  with  such  a  spell 

In  the  spirit's  pure,  deep  fountains, 
Whence  the  holy  passions  well, 

As  that  melody  of  Nature, 
That  subdued,  subduing  strain 

Which  is  played  upon  the  shingles 

By  the  patter  of  the  rain. 

8 


THE    HEKOES    OF    THE    PEN. 

Sine  caede,  sine  sanguine  ....  vicistis. — CICERO. 

IN  the  old  time  gone,  ere  came  the  Dawn 

To  the  ages  dark  and  dim, 
Who  wielded  the  sword  with  mightiest  brawn, 

The  world  bowed  down  to  him : 
The  hand  most  red  with  the  slaughtered  dead, 

Most  potent  waved  command, 
And  Mars  from  the  sky  of  glory  shed 

His  light  like  a  blazing  brand. 
But  fiery  Mars  among  the  stars 

Grew  pale  and  paler  when, 
At  the  Morn,  came  Yenus  ushering  in 

The  Heroes  of  the  Pen. 


THE   HEROES   OF    THE   PEN.  91 

Not  with  sword  and  flame  these  Heroes  came 

To  ravage  and  to  slay, 
But  the  savage  soul  with  thought  to  tame, 

And  with  love  and  reason  sway ; 
NOT  good  steel  wrought  that  battles  fought 

In  the  centuries  of  yore, 
Was  ever  so  bright  as  they  burnished  thought, 

To  cut  into  error's  core ; 
And  in  the  fight  for  truth  and  right, 

Not  a  hundred  thousand  men 
Of  the  heroes  old  were  match  for  one 

Of  the  Heroes  of  the  Pen. 


For  the  weapon  they  wield,  nor  armor  nor  shield 

Endures  for  a  single  dint, 
Nor  glave  withstands,  nor  bayonet  steeled, 

Nor  powder,  and  ball,  and  flint: 
It  touches  the  thing  called  Slave  or  King, 

And  the  Man  doth  reappear, 
As  did  from  the  toad  the  Seraph  spring 

At  the  touch  of  IthurieFs  spear; 


THE   HEROES   OF   THE  PEN. 

And  wherever  down  it  strikes  a  crown, 
Says  sovereign  to  serf,  Amen ! 

Amen!  and  hurra,  the  people  cry, 
For  the  Heroes  of  the  Pen ! 


Upon  old  tomes,  those  catacombs 

Of  the  dead  and  buried  time, 
They  lay  the  base  of  glory's  domes, 

And  build  with  truth  sublime ; 
And  from  their  hight  directing  the  fight 

Of  the  right  against  the  wrong, 
They  fill  the  world  with  the  lettered  might 

Of  eloquence  and  song. 
Nor  buried  they  lie  with  those  who  die 

At  threescore  years  and  ten, 
But  atop  the  piles  they  have  builded,  sleep 

The  Heroes  of  the  Pen. 


Hurra  for  the  true !  of  old  or  new, 
Who  heroes  lived  or  fell — 


THE   HEROES   OF    THE   PEN. 

Thermopylae's  immortal  few ! 

Hurra  for  the  Switzer  Tell ! 
Upvoioe  to  sty  the  brave  Gracchi ! 

Hurra  for  the  Pole  and  the  Hun ! 
For  the  men  who  made  the  Great  July ! 

Hurra  for  WASHINGTON  ! 
Yet  old  Time  Past  would  triumph  at  last — 

But  hurra,  and  hurra  again, 
For  the  Heroes  who  triumph  over  Time ! 

The  Heroes  of  the  Pen. 


THEENODY  FOE  FLOEA 

WRITTEN  FQR  HER  PARENTS. 

Our  of  the  cluster  of  our  love, 
A  star  has  vanished  up  the  sky ; 

Out  of  our  nest,  a  spirit  dove 
Has  flown  angelically  high. 


A  gap  is  in  our  fireside  ring 
The  wideness  of  a  little  tomb ; 

A  prattle  such  as  robins  sing, 
Has  faded  out  of  every  room. 


THRENODY    FOR   FLORA.  95 

Our  hearts  long  for  her  pretty  charms 

Of  babish  questions  manifold, 
And  for  the  little  hugging  arms 

Now  locked  across  her  bosom  cold. 


Her  bright  hair,  and  her  eyes  that  beamed 
So  bonnily,  oh,  how  we  miss ! 

And,  oh,  her  loving  lips !  that  seemed 
Fashioned  so  purposely  to  kiss. 


As  fond  hearts  that  in  exile  be, 
Grow  homesick  for  the  ones  they  love, 

So  we  grow  heavensick  to  see 
Our  pet  seraphical  above. 


Pet  of  the  angels !  in  that  home, 
Faith  sees  her  face  serenely  fair ; 

For,  as  she  entered  heaven's  dome, 
She  left  a  window  open  there. 


ON!    EIGHT   ON! 

ON  !  right  on !     Art  thou  immortal, 

Born  to  act,  and  deeds  to  do, 
And  yet  sittest  in  the  portal 

Of  thy  destiny?    Pass  through! 

On!  right  on!  strike — stave  to  slivers 
Error's  gates  that  bar  thy  way ; 

Enter,  and  live  with  the  livers ! 
Live  and  act,  while  yet  'tis  day. 

On !  right  on !  for  night  is  coming — 
Night  of  life,  which  comes  to  all — 

When  Death's  fingers,  chill  and  numbing, 
Seal  the  lids  and  spread  the  pall. 


ONI    RIGHT    ON!  97 

On  1  right  on !     Life  is  a  battle, 

Where  who  wins  must  be  a  brave ; 
For  erelong  the  clods  shall  rattle 

On  the  coffin  in  the  grave. 


On !  right  on !     His  name  is  Legion, 
That  has  resolution's  arm ; 

Victor  he  o'er  many  a  region 
Ere  dull  plodders  take  alarm. 


On !  right  on !  with  high  ambition, 
Make  that  viper,  Slander,  feel 

Writhings  of  submiss  contrition, 
With  his  head  beneath  thy  heel. 


On !  right  on !     Think  not  life  ending 

When  thou  liest  down  to  die : 
On !  right  on !  brave  soul,  ascending, 

Soar  forever  in  the  sky ! 
9 


THE    EDEN    OF   WISHES. 

IT  is  at  the  foot  of  a  mountain 

Whose  high  brow  is  bared  before  God, 
There  gushes  a  crystalline  fountain, 

And  makes  a  bright  brook  in  the  sod. 


And  the  sod  spreads  away  o'er  a  valley 
That  opens  where  blue  waters  be ; 

And  the  brook  with  meandering  dally 
Goes  babbling  along  to  the  sea. 

There  snowy  sails  pass,  like  the  lazy 
White  clouds  of  a  summery  sky — 

Appear  and  evanish  where  hazy 
Infinity  fences  the  eye. 


THE    EDEN    OF   WISHES.  99 

Here  falls  over  Fan's  mossy  pillows 

The  green  gloom  of  tropical  groves, 
And  Poesy  hears  the  low  billows 

In  airs  that  come  up  from  the  coves. 

And  here,  while  the  sands  of  light  sunny 
Sift  down  through  the  leaves  from  above, 

The  wild  bee  gads  hunting  for  honey, 
"With  wings  wove  of  whispers  of  love. 

Here  the  ripples  make  music  more  mellow, 
More  sweet  than  the  stops  of  a  flute ; 

Here  the  dark  sky  of  leaves  is  starred  yellow 
With  thick  constellations  of  fruit. 


This  valley  so  pleasantly  lonely, 

Wherethrough  doth  the  waterbrook  run, 

Holds  one  little  cottage,  one  only, 
And  one  little  maid,  only  one. 

Her  blue  eyes  are  clear  pools  of  passion, 
Her  lips  have  the  tremor  of  leaves, 


100  THE    EDEN    OF    WISHES. 

And  the  speech  that  her  lovely  thoughts  fashion, 
Is  sweeter  than  poetry  weaves. 

Flirtation,  gross,  flippant,  and  cruel, 

Ne'er  handled  the  hues  on  the  wings 
Of  her  love ;  in  her  heart  is  a  jewel 

No  cunning  of  flattery  strings. 

t 

For  dwells  all  alone  here  the  maiden, 
And  waits  for  a  true  lover's  kiss  : 

Who  would  sigh  for  angelical  Aiden, 
With  her  in  an  Eden  like  this  ? 

'Tis  the  Eden  of  Wishes,  unreal, 

.<& 
This  valley  by  sea  bordered  blue, 

And  the  maiden  is  all  an  ideal — 
I  was  but  romancing  to  you. 


CAKOLINE. 

HEK  eyes  were  blue  and  softly  bright, 
As  morningglories  wet  with  dew ; 

Her  hair  was  like  a  cloud  of  night, 
That  streams  of  moonlight  struggle  through. 

i  •  • 

Her  cheeks  were  of  the  hue  of  shells 
That  ope  their  bosoms  in  the  sea ; 

Her  voice,  the  chime  of  silver  bells, 
Forever  ringing  out  a  glee. 


Her  mien  was  modest  as  the  droop 

Of  meadow  lilies  o'er  a  stream : 
Her  light  step,  graceful  as  their  stoop 

When  soft  winds  wake  them  from  a  dream. 


102  CAROLINE. 

A  truth  was  in  her  earnest  glance, 
On  which,  the  heart  would  aye  rely ; 

Her  every  sigh  inspired  a  trance, 
As  'twere  a  whisper  from  the  sky. 


She  was  the  dove  of  spirit  birds — 
The  queen  that  wore  the  coronet 

Of  young  love's  reign — in  sober  words, 
She  was  a  beautiful  coquette. 


MABELLE. 

WE  walked  where  the  grass  was  checkered 
With  the  light  through  the  leaves  of  May, 

While  the  night,  in  her  white  shroud  of  moonshine, 
Seemed  the  beautiful  ghost  of  day. 

The  presence  that  made  it  a  rapture 

To  walk  in  that  bowery  shade, 
Was  a  fond  being,  meek  in  her  beauty, 

Half  seraph  and  half  loving  maid. 

Her  voice  had  the  sorrowful  cadence 

Of  winds  in  a  thicket  of  pine, 
While  her  eyes,  like  the  leaf-filtered  moonlight, 

Streamed  through  their  long  lashes  to  mine. 


104  MABELLE. 

We  had  come  to  the  end  of  the  rainbow, 

That  had  ever  eluded  till  then, 
And  our  hearts,  which  had  always  prayed  double, 

Now  were  beating  the  blessed  amen. 

Laved  our  souls  in  love's  river  Lethean 
Till  the  moon  in  the  west  grew  white, 

And  along  the  dim  shore  of  morning 
Broke  the  first  purple  billows  of  light. 

When  that  red  sea  of  dawn  had  swoln  over 

The  beaconing  morning  star, 
Of  our  vessels  of  life  one  was  shipwreck 

On  the  coast  of  God's  heaven  afar. 

The  vail  between  her  and  the  angels 
Was  rent  by  our  parting  that  dawn ; 

And  returning  some  summer  moons  after, 
How  I  mourned  for  my  beautiful  gone ! 

Oh !  the  love  that  first  rendeth  the  heartstrings, 

Is  the  love  that  continueth  well ; 
And  though  I  lived  mortal  through  ages, 

All  my  life  were  a  sigh  for  Mabelle. 


IMMOKTAL    GLOKY. 

How  MANY  of  the  bright  names  now  that  gleam 
In  glory's  heaven,  skyed  magnific  spheres, 
Shall  cast  their  brilliant  shadows  in  the  stream 
Of  memory  ten  hundred  thousand  years  ? 

Who  knows  but  we  are  in  the  night,  and  yet 
There  is  a  universal  sun  to  rise, 
When  all  these  twinkling  stars  of  fame  shall  set, 
Or  fade  into  the  nothing  of  the  skies  ? 

Mankind  may  climb  the  pyramid  of  soul, 
Up  by  the  stairflight  of  the  centuries, 
So  high  that  he  can  hear  the  anthems  roll 
Of  seraphim,  and  see  where  heaven  is. 


106  IMMORTAL   GLORY. 

And  then  the  loud  huzzas  of  these  low  times, 
That  send  up  great  names,  may  not  strike  their  ears, 
Enraptured  with  the  fugues  of  upper  climes, 
And  with  the  rolling  music  of  the  spheres. 

The  highest  peaks  of  glory  now  that  rise 
May  yet  be  whelmed  rocks  in  that  spirit  sea 
On  whose  calm  tide,  upfloating  toward  the  skies, 
The  ark  of  raised  humanity  shall  be. 

Hope  not  to  live  immortal  in  a  sound 

That  Admiration  tongues  and  pens  today : 

Ere  roll  the  million  future  ages  round, 

Where  will  the  sound  be?  letters— where  will  they? 

Nay,  sounds  must  die,  and  letters  that  enshrine 
Their  corses,  too,  may  utterly  decay ; 
But  thoughts,  which  are  their  quick  ghosts,  have  divine 
Existence,  and  shall  never  pass  away. 

No  drop  of  thought  once  mingled  with  the  sea 
Of  soul,  shall  perish,  though  it  disappear: 
The  viewless  vapor  it  shall  form,  may  be 
Part  of   a  rainbow  in  some  distant  year. 


IMMORTAL    GLORY.  107 

Or,  rising  in  its  darkness,  it  may  swell 
Some  thundercloud  of  passion  yet  to  loom ; 
For  thought,  of  heaven  born,  or  born  of  hell, 
Doubles  itself  for  aye  in  gleam  or  gloom. 

Then,  seek  not  glory ;  it  is  utter  naught — : 
More  unsubstantial  than  a  fairy's  kiss ; 
To  be  immortal,  thou  must  think  a  thought ! 
Earth  has  no  immortality  but  this. 


EMMA    STUAKT. 

OH  !  the  voices  of  the  crickets, 

Chirping  sad  along  the  lea, 
Are  the  very  tears  of  music 

Unto  melancholy  me ; 
And  the  katydids'  responses 

Up  among  the  locust  leaves, 
Make  my  spirit  very  lonesome 

On  these  pensive  autumn  eves, 


For  they  mind  me,  Emma  Stuart, 

Of  the  bygone,  blessed  times, 
When  our  heartbeats  paired  together 

Like  sweet  syllables  in  rhymes  ; 
Ere  the  faith  of  love  was  broken, 

And  our  locked  hands  fell  apart, 
And  the  vanity  of  promise 

Left  a  void  in  either  heart. 


EMMA    STUART.  109 

Art  them  happy,  Emma  Stuart? 

I  again  may  happy  be 
Nevermore :  the  autumn  insects, 

In  the  grass,  and  on  the  tree, 
Crying  as  for  very  sorrow 

At  the  coming  of  the  frost, 
Are  to  me  love's  fallen  angels, 

Wailing  for  their  heaven  lost. 


Often,  often,  Emma  Stuart, 

On  such  solemn  nights  as  this, 
Have  we  sat  and  mused  together 

Of  the  perfectness  of  bliss — 
Of  the  hope  that  lit  the  darkness 

Of  the  future  with  its  ray, 
"Which  was  like  a  star  in  heaven, 

Beautiful,  but  far  away ! 


By  the  gateway,  where  the  locust 
Of  the  moonlight  made  eclipse, 

And  the  river  ripple  sounded 
Like  the  murmur  of  sweet  lips, 


HO  EMMA    STUART. 

There  a  little  maiden  waited, 
Telling  all  the  moments  o'er — 

Emma  Stuart !  Emma  Stuart ! 
Waits  the  maiden  there  no  more? 


No !  ah,  no !     Along  the  pathway 

Grows  the  high,  untrampled  grass, 
Where  the  cricket  stops  to  listen 

For  thy  wonted  feet  to  pass ; 
But  thy  footsteps,  Emma  Stuart, 

Press  no  more  the  doorway  stone, 
Trip  no  more  along  the  pathway — 

And  the  cricket  sings  alone. 


It  is  veiy  mournful  musing, 

On  such  solemn  nights  as  this, 
How  evanished  all  the  promise 

Of  the  perfectness  of  bliss : 
Love's  green  grave  between  us,  Emma, 

Keeps  us  parted  ayef and  aye — 
Even  not  to  know  each  other 

In  the  Love  Land  far  away ! 


TO    MY   WIFE. 

OUR  lives  were  two  dark  clouds  of  night, 
That  shadowed  hope's  clear  stars  above, 

And  fast  were  sinking  out  of  sight ; 

When,  meeting  in  the  morning  light, 
They  mingled  there  in  blushing  love. 

Since  then  our  life  has  been  a  day 

Of  summer  birds  and  summer  blooms : 
Forenoon  has  wellnigh  passed  away, 
But  love's  bright  sun  has  lost  no  ray, 

Undimmed  by  passion's  thundering  glooms. 


112  TO    MY    WIFE. 

Yet,  be  it  storm  or  be  it  shine, 

Nor  shine  nor  storm  onrself  can  sever; 

For  I  am  resolutely  thine, 

Thou  art  affectionately  mine, 
And  thou  and  I  are  we  forever. 


And  when  the  Mystery  is  passed — 
Hereafter  linked  to  Heretofore — 
I  saved  through  thee,  we  one  at  last 
Shall  be  one  spirit  in  the  vast 
Kingdom  of  Love  forevermore. 


i     o  _(i  •<  . 

\   . 


THE    END-  QF   THE    KAINBOW 

I  wis  of  a  region 

Whose  heavenly  scope 
Holds  many  a  legion 

Of  angels  of  hope — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

Endure  the  dull  present, 

Its  toil,  moil,  and  sorrow! 
We  shall  all  find  that  pleasant 

Elysium  tomorrow — 

At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 
10 


THE    END    OF  THE 


There  the  sky  never  varies 
From  glory  to  gloom ; 

There  infinite  prairies 
Eternally  bloom — 

At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

The  bees  hive  no  honey 

In  that  happy  land ; 
For  the  days  are  all  sunny, 

The  air  always  bland — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

There  Love,  by  the  mountains, 

Climbs  into  the  sky, 
And  Peace  drinks  at  fountains 

That  never  go  dry — 

At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

There  pleasure's  enjoyment, 

In  ardent  career, 
Never  ends  in  the  cloyment 

That  follows  it  here — 

At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 


THE   END   OF    THE   RAINBOW 

His  bright  pinion  sunk 
At  the  goal  of  his  mission, 

There  Hope  slumbers,  drunk 
With  the  wine  of  fruition — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

i 

No  shadow  Cimmerian 

Of  ignorance  there ; 
But  fountains  Pierian 

Jet  into  the  air — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

There  glitter  the  riches 

That  age  never  rusts ; 
There  glory's  proud  niches 

Are  filled  with  our  busts — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 

Endure  the  dull  present, 
Its  toil,  moil,  and  sorrow ! 

We  shall  all  find  the  pleasant 
Elysium  tomorrow — 
At  the  end  of  the  rainbow. 


MISGIVING. 


OH  !  can  it  be  that  this  is  all  of  life, 
Betwixt  a  cradle  and  a  coffin?     Death! 
Canst  thou  put  out  thi§  spark  of  'God,  the  soul, 
Amid  the  humid  ashes  of  the  grave  ? 
This  marvelous  existency!  this  dream, 
Bounded  each  side  by  night,  is  there  no  morn 
To  be,  that  we  may  then  remeniber  it,' <  - 
And  know  it  a  reality? — The  grave 
And  nothing !     Doubt,  the  horrid  gqblin,,  haunts 
The  gloomy  chambers  of  my  brain,  and  wails  : 

"The  grave  and  nothing!     Love  while  yet  the  heart 
Throbs  warm ;  and  when  the  eye  whose  thrilling  glance 
Beams  in  among  the  shadows  of  thy  spirit, 


MISGIVING. 

Like  sunshine  in  the  forest,  shall  grow  dull 
And  vacant,  and  the  lip's  red  bloom  grow  pale, 
Gaze  then  thy  last,  and  kiss  thy  last ;  for  love 
Ends  here  forever !     Rainbows  hope  may  arch 
In  spans  of  beauty,  that  shall  link  thy  years 
One  to  an  other  gloriously,  and  tint 
The  clouds  of  sorrow ;  yet  the  last  bright  arch 
Is  broke  by  darkness ;  ay,  it  can  not  span 
The  gloomy  valley  of  the  shadow,  death ! 
Take  on  the  wings  of  thought,  and  soar  away—- 
Away most  infinitely  nothingward ! — 
Away !  till  Earth  gleam  smaller  than  the  eye 
Of  whom  thou  lovest — on !  away !  till  thought 
Grow  crazy  with  infinity,  alone 
With  the  magnificent  creation — on ! 
Where  Fancy  flaps  her  pennons  full  against 
The  battlement  of  Paradise,  and  soul 
Deems  to  have  traveled  far  enough  to  reach 
The  home  of  God :  and  yet  eternity 
Of  matter,  world,  world,  world,  outstretches  still 
Beyond.     No  spirit  greets  thee  in  thy  course; 
Thou  hearst  no  rustle  of  the  wings  of  angels ; 
No  whisper  of  intelligences  here ; 
Naught  here  but  matter,  matter  without  end : 


13  MISGIVING. 

Thou  art  alone  amid  the  silent  wheels 
Of  the  interminable  mechanism." 

Great  God  Almighty ! — for  THOU  AKT  ;  eke  who 
Did  frame  this  endless,  awful  universe? — 
Shall  man,  who  loves,  and  hopes,  and  thinks,  and  feels, 
And  weeps,  and  shrieks  for  everlastingness, 
Shall  he  end  utterly  here  in  the  grave? 
Hope  no !  in  God's  large  mercy,  no !     While  all 
Unconscious,  careless  things,  incapable 
Of  being  nothing,  must  forever  be, 
Shall  mind,  the  only  thing  that  knows  to  be, 
Be  nothing?    Seems  not  like  a  God,  to  cause 
It  so.     We  know  not ;  all  is  mystery : 
Life's  awful  problem — the  solution,  death ! 


EYES. 

.*  v 

WHEN  from  the  night  where  no  dreams  are, 

Life's  dawning  rays  begin, 
Then  woman's  eye,  the  morning  star, 

Is  there  to  tremble  in. 

The  wings  of  Memory  are  set 

With  eyes  of  every  hue 
That  eyes  may  be,  from  merry  jet 

To  melancholy  blue. 

The  first  bright  pair  that  clung  my  heart, 

As  magnet  clings  the  steel, 
Had  each  a  flashing,  wicked  dart 

Their  black  could  not  conceal. 


li>0  EYES. 

The  next,  which  lay  upon  my  soul, 
Like  moonlight  globes  of  dew, 

Death's  angel  all  their  heaven  stole, 
To  make  the  sky  more  blue. 

The  next  were  hazel :  they  were  lit 

At  passion's  hottest  flame ; 
Whomever  once  their  glory  smit, 

Forgot  his  very  name. 

The  next  were  like  the  gray  of  sky, 
Ere  breaks  the  beamy  light ; 

The  flame  of  love,  like  dawn  was  nigh, 
Though  bosomed  out  of  sight. 

The  next — song  can  not  paint  their  hue ; 

Their  orbs,  which  toward  me  roll— • 
Nor  brown,  nor  gray,  nor  black,  nor  blue — 

Are  of  the  hue  of  soul ! 

When  into  night  where  mysteries  are, 
Life's  lingering  sunbeams  fade, 

Then  woman's  eye,  the  evening  star, 
Illumes  the  solemn  shade. 


MINNEHAHA. 

.  *. 
ERE  the  Muses  transatlantic, 

Pale  of  face,  and  blue  of  eye, 
Found  the  wilderness  romantic 

'Neath  the  occidental  sky, 
Think  not  then  was  here  no  worship 

Of  the  beautiful  and  grand ; 
Think  not  Nature  had.  no;  wooers 

In  the  wild  Hesperian  land. 

Poesy,  agrestic  maiden, 

Wild- eyed,  black-haired,  haunted  here, 
Singing  of  the  Indian  Aiden, 

Southwest  of  this  mortal  sphere ; 
Singing  of  the  good  Great  Spirit, 

Who  is  in  and  over  all:   >  •••  *   ^  *? 
11 


122  MINNEHAHA. 

Singing  sweetly  every  river, 
Mountain,  wood,  and  waterfall. 

And  this  dark  Parnassian  maiden, 

Sang  sublimely  war's  wild  art; 
Sang  of  love  and  lips  love-laden 

With  the  honey  of  the  heart. 
But  the  warsong's  frantic  music, 

And  the  deathsong's  roundelay, 
And  the  lovesong's  rude  cantata, 

Westward,  westward  die  away. 

These  will  with  the  red  tribes  perish ; 
For  their  language  leaves  nor  scroll 

Nor  tradition  writ,  to  cherish 
Such  immortalness  of  soul. 

So,  the  names  that  they  have  given 
To  the  charms  of  Nature  here — 

Stream,  cascade,  lake,  hill,  and  valley- 
Let  us  fervently  revere. 

For,  though  civil  life  effaces 
All  else  they  have  gloried  in, 

Yet  this  poetry  of  places 
Will  remind  us  they  have  been : 


MINNEHAHA. 


Therefore,  white  man,  pioneering 
Far  and  farther  in  the  west, 

Let  the  Indian  names  be  sacred, 
Though  thou  ravage  all  the  rest. 


Call  not  cataracted  rapid 

That  has  leaped  its  way  and  riven, 
By  his  own  name,  curt  and  vapid, 

That  some  Saxon  boor  has  given ! 
But  let  Nature  keep  her  titles ! 

Let  her  name  the  quick  cascade 
Minnehaha — Laughing  Water — 

In  the  language  she  has  made ! 

Minnehaha !  how  it  gushes 

Like  a  flow  of  laughter  out ! 
Minnehaha !  how  it  rushes 

Downward  with  a  gleeful  shout ! 
Minnehaha !  to  the  echoes — 

Minnehaha !  back  the  same — 
Minnehaha!  Minnehaha! 

Live  forever  that  sweet  name ! 


A   SONG   FOE   THE    CKATS. 

THERE  is  hope  on  the  banks  of  the  Danube, 

There  is  hope  in  the  grand  tintamar 
Of  cannon,  and  music,  and  clangor, 

"Where  Sultan  encounters  with  Czar ; 
There  is  hope  where  the  sway  of  the  Tartar 

Is  swept  down  the  bloody  Hoang ; 
There  is  hope  for  the  Isles  of  the  Morning 

In  Liberty's  bugle  twang : 
Down,  down  with  the  Autocrat ! 
Hurra  for  the  Democrat ! 

Is  Liberty's  bugle  twang. 


THE  CB'Af  S. 


The  blood  that  has.  flowed  from  old  heroes, 

And  settled  in  Lord,  Prince,  or  Don, 
Shall  find  the  true  level  of  manhood, 

As  the  current  of  Freedom  rolls  on  ; 
For  the  work),  is  .aweary  of  nobles, 

Who  groan  when  trie  people  rci<  ice, 
Rejoice  at  the.  groans  of  the  people,      .  .  , 

And  shudder  at  Liberty  't  y^jqe:  \ 
Down,  down  witfy  th'  Aristocrat! 
Hurra  for  the  Democrat  ! 

Is  Liberty's  righteous  voice. 


Yet  it  were  but  a  change  of  oppressors, 

To  fly  from  the  Blood  to  the  Burse — • 
From  th'  Aristocrat's  power  of  birthright, 

To  the  Aurocrat's  power  of  purse ; 
But  all,  they  must  all  be  down  stricken ! 

The  thunder  is  in  the  sky ; 
It  waits  but  for  Truth's  invocation, 

It  waits  but  for  Liberty's  cry: 
Down,  down  with  the  Aurocrat ! 
Hurra  for  the  Democrat ! 

And  this  shall  be  Liberty's  cry. 


126  A    SONG    FOR   THE   CRATS. 

The  Autocrat  rushes  to  ruin, 

Th'  Aristocrat  waxes  old ; 
And  thought,  in  Democracy's  balance, 

Shall  weigh  down  the  Aurocrat's  gold. 
From  the  turmoil  of  thick  revolutions, 

Mobocracy's  chaos  of  wrong, 
A  fair  world  of  order  is  forming, 

That  shall  unto  Freedom  belong: 
Dowfi,  down  with  the  Mobocrat ! 
Hurra  for  the  Democrat ! 

And  the  world  shall  to  Freedom  belong. 
MAY,  1852. 


LEGEND    OF   THE    ALABAMA. 

LET  ine  tell  thee,  Love,  a  legend 
Of  a  stream  whose  waters  roll 

Toward  the  Aiden  of  the  Indian, 
Southwest  Country  of  the  Soul. 

It  is  said  that  in  the  language 
Which  the  Manitou  loved  best, 

Was  the  meaning  of  the  sweet  word 
Alabama,  HERE  WE  BEST. 

Well,  along  the  Shenandoah, 
Where  the  ripples  run  like  rhyme, 

Lived  a  tribe  that  spoke  this  language, 
In  the  dimly  distant  time. 


128       LEGEND  OF  THE  ALABAMA. 

It  was  moons  and  moons  unnumbered 
Ere  the  Spanish  Christian  men 

Had  come  sailing  from  the  sunrise ; 
And  Wahleeyah  reigned  here  then. 

And  Wahleeyah  was  a  sachem 
With  a  forehead  like  the  dawn ; 

Keen  his  dark  eye  as  the  eagle's, 
Yet  as  .mild  as  of  the  fawn. 

He  had  n$ver  scalped  a  foeman, 
Never  widowed  loving  squaw ; 

But  his  great  soul  was  a  glory, 
And  his  gentle,  word  was  law. 

He  had  talked  with;  the -Great  Spirit, 
On  the  far  blue  hills  above, 

Teaching  thence  his  tribe,  that  better 
Than  to  slay,  it  is  to  love. 

So  they  smoked  the  sacred  peacepipe, 
Smoked  with  all  the  tribes  around : 

v 

Long  the  tomahawk  was  buried, 
In  their  happy  hunting-ground. 


LEGEND  OF  THE  ALABAMA.       129 

Peaceful  lived  they  as  the  spirits 

Of  the  hunters  in  the  sky ; 
Till  one  midnight,  from  the  north  land, 

Came  a  clan  with  hideous  cry. 

Yells  went  up  along  the  hillside, 

Yells  went  clamoring  through  the  vale ; 

All  the  wilderness  was  horror 
With  the  wild  whoop  and  the  wail. 

Piling  up  between  the  fierce  foe 

And  his  kindred,  heaps  of  dead, 
Reeked  the  right  hand  of  Wahleeyah 

First  that  night  with  slaughter  red. 

i 
Brave  he  fought  for  love  and  freedom, 

Till,  at  rise  of  morning  star, 
On  the  free  hills  were  his  loved  ones, 

From  their  fathers'  graves  afar. 

Where  the  golden  threads  of  sunlight 

Were  inwoven  through  the  leaves, 
Of  the  harvest  hot  of  battle 

Lay  the  reaped,  ungathered  sheaves. 


130        LEGEND  OF  THE  ALABAMA. 

But  Wahleeyah,  on  that  morning, 
With  the  rescued  of  his  band, 

Sought  the  sweet  Southwest,  aspiring 
There  to  find  the  Spirit  Land. 

For  his  soul  was  sick  of  bloodshed, 
And  he  hoped  to  find  a  rest 

From  the  warwhoop  and  the  deathyell, 
In  the  green  groves  of  the  blest. 

Many  a  time  they  fixed  their  wigwams, 
Fondly  deeming  they  had  found 

That  hoped  happy  land  of  spirits, 
The  celestial  hunting-ground. 

But  some  clan  would  come,  and  drive  them 
From  their  pleasant  place  away ; 

When  again  they  journeyed  onward, 
Wellnigh  weary  of  the  day. 

When  the  last,  consumptive  blushes 
Glowed  upon  the  summer's  cheek, 

Came  they  where  the  grand  magnolia 
Skyward  reared  its  snowy  peak. 


LEGEND    OF    THE    ALABAMA. 

Spicy  airs  among  the  cypress 

Whispered  soft,  mysterious  words, 

And  as  ghosts  of  earthly  sorrows 
Seemed  the  beautiful,  bright  birds. 

All  along  the  hazy  valley 

Lay  the  formless  sprite  of  dreams, 
And  the  golden  ghost  of  sunlight 

Flashed  upon  the  spirit  streams. 

They  had  found  it!  they  had  found  it! 

Found  the  Country  of  the  Soul ! 
Reached  the  river  whose  clear  waters 

Through  that  forest  heaven  roll ! 

Rushed  they  to  this  limpid  river, 

Fancied  river  of  the  blest, 
And  the  chieftain  cried,  in  transport, 

Alabama ! — HERE  WE  REST. 

So  this  river,  from  the  language 
Which  the  Manitou  loved  best, 

Took  the  name  of  Alabama — 
Alabama,  HERE  WE  REST. 


WKESTLING. 

IN  sooth,  it  is  not  worth  to  live, 
This  petty  round  of  mine ! 

My  soul  is  frantically  drunk 
With  strong  Ambition's  wine, 

Yet  ever  and  forever  sunk 
In  Need's  low,  snaky  twine. 


Anon  it  wrenches  off  the  coils 

"With  a  most  maniac  might, 
And  leaps  up  toward  the  stars  that  shine 

In  life's  mysterious  night — 
To  fall  back  in  a  tighter  twine, 

And  in  a  fiercer  fight! 


WRESTLING. 


Give  way !  give  way !  I  must  go  up ! 

"I  is  death  to  linger  here ! 
My  strangling  spirit  must  have  air ! 

Air  of  an  other  sphere ! — 
Ah !  Hope  is  dead,  young  Hope  the  fair, 

And  I  chained  to  her  bier. 


I  am  as  in  a  gloomy  vale ; 

I  see  the  summits  dim 
Of  Glory's  mountains,  like  the  dreams 

That  Mab's  fine  fingers  limn ; 
But  I  am  islanded  by  streams 

Too  cold  and  wide  to  swim ! 


KEMINISCENOES. 

I  FEEL  the  clear  brook  of  boyhood 
Mow  into  my  soul  tonight, 

And  Memory  flashes  her  pinions, 
Like  a  bird,  in  the  waters  bright. 


I  stand  by  the  lake  Keeuka, 

Where  we  ran  from  school  to  swim  ;- 
Hah!  there  is  the  blind  old  fisher! 

Eight  well  I  remember  him. 

All  day,  with  his  skiff  at  anchor 
Far  out  on  the  limpid  blue, 

He  trolled  for  the  beautiful  salmon, 
Till  he  felt  the  fall  of  the  dew. 


REMINISCENCES,  135 

Then  the  lake-blue  eyes  of  Minnie 
Would  watch  till  he  rowed  ashore: 

Oh !  the  wonderful  eyes  of  his  Minnie 
The  fisher  might  see  no  more. 

In  the  green  witch-hazel  bushes 

We  lurked  till  the  school  let  out, 
Then  joined  with  the  whooping  children, 

And  boldly  ran  home  with  a  shout. 

How  we  pillaged  the  nest  of  the  blackbird, 

Where  the  flaggy  forest  grew ! 
And  pilfered  the  eggs  of  the  robin, 

So  round  and  so  temptingly  blue! 

In  the  balmy  eves  of  the  summer, 
When  the  air  floated  full  of  the  moon, 

We  played  on  the  green  of  the  common, 
Till  the  night  rounded  up  to  the  noon. 

And  nights  when  the  white  snow  of  whiter 

Like  a  frozen  moonlight  lay, 
Down  the  slippery  steep  of  the  hillside 

We  skimmed  on  the  dizzy  sleigh. 


136  REMINISCENCES. 

The  brother  who  mated  my  spirit 
In  the  rush  of  its  morning  flow, 

Grew  up  with  me  into  manhood — 
But  now  he  lies  under  the  snow ! 

Oh !  the  winds  of  night  are  crying, 
-  Like  women  when  they  weep ! 

Let  me  fly  away  from  my  sorrow, 
And  be  a  glad  boy  in  my  sleep ! 


12 


THE   LAND   KEDEEMED. 

NOT  always  shall  this  sacred  earth 

Be  at  the  nabob's  nod ; 
The  land  shall  be  redeemed  at  last, 

And  rendered  back  to  God: 
Then  each  shall  of  the  acres  hold 

Enough  to  make  him  free ; 
None  shall  usurp  more  than  his  need, 

And  none  shall  landless  be. 


136  THE  LAND    REDEEMED. 

The  system  of  old  feudal  wrong, 

That  makes  the  people  pay 
For  room  to  live  upon  the  earth, 

Fades  even  now  away : 
Erelong  the  landlord  shall  become 

A  laughter  and  a  scoff, 
As  swells  the  tide  of  human  rights 

To  sweep  his  landmarks  off. 


For  man  perceives  the  truth  at  last — 

Long  faded  in  the  dim — 
That  record,  scroll,  nor  parchment  writ 

Can  take  the  earth  from  him ; 
That  Nature  makes  a  title  deed 

To  each  one  for  his  time 
In  his  own  want,  and  who  takes  more, 

He  perpetrates  a  crime. 


This  simple  truth  shall  turn  the  cheek 

Of  pale  Starvation  red, 
As  over  old  ancestral  parks 

The  pauper's  sheaves  are  spread ; 


THE   LAND    REDEEMED.  139 

This  truth  shall  put  the  gewgaws  all 

Of  kingcraft  under  ban, 
And  man  shall  meet  his  fellow  on 

The  common  platform,  MAN. 


Then  prince  and  peasant,  side  by  side, 

Shall  gladsome  toilers  be, 
And  grades  go  down  the  flood  of  right, 

As  dead  wood  to  the  sea ; 
For  when  each  has  his  human  right 

Of  home  upon  the  soil, 
All  shall  be  Princes  of  the  Soul, 

Ennobled  by  their  toil. 


Philosophy  shall  then  sublime 

Each  heart  to  pure  desire, 
Beginning  with  the  little  child 

Beside  the  winter  fire ; 
Religion  true  shall  hover  round 

On  starry  summer  eves, 
And  Song  transport  the  happy  homes, 

Eural  among  the  leaves. 


140  THE   LAND    REDEEMED. 

Glad  time  of  earth's  beatitude! 

When  none  shall  hoard  or  steal, 
But  all  mankind  together  work 

For  universal  weal — 
The  warlike  and  the  evil  yield 

To  peaceful  and  to  good, 
And  nations  all  take  hold  of  hands 

In  loving  sisterhood. 


LITTLE    FANNY. 

OP  home's  boyish  blisses 
Heart-echoed  for  aye, 

Were  prattles  and  kisses 
That  Death  stole  away. 

Oh !  Death  has  no  pity ! 

He  took,  while  he  smiled, 
Took  Fanny,  the  pretty, 

The  fond  little  child. 

From  mother-love  duty, 
From  father-love  pride, 

He  lured  the  young  beauty, 
To  make  her  his  bride. 


142  LITTLE    FANSTY. 


Her  hair  was  a  cluster 
Of  glooms  and  of  gleams, 

And  her  eyes  had  the  luster 
That  stars  have  in  dreams. 

The  busiest  rover 
That  buzzes  and  sips, 

Never  found  honeyed  clover 
Like  Fanny's  red  lips. 

Her  cheeks  were  ripe  peaches, 
Her  voice  was  a  bird's, 

Making  sweet  little  speeches 
Without  any  words. 

And  she  was  love's  very 

Ideal  of  love ; 
Not  moody,  not  merry, 

But  mild,  like  a  dove. 

So  near  the  sweet  lisper 
To  heaven  did  keep, 

That  angels  could  whisper 
To  her  in  her  sleep. 


LITTLE   FANNY.  143 

Too  near !  for  her  smiling 

In  dreams  as  she  lay, 
Showed  they  were  beguiling 

Her  spirit  away. 

And  once,  as  the  peaches 

Grew  flush  with  the  sun, 
The  heavenward  reaches 

Of  her  life  were  done. 

Above  the  stars'  glister, 

Above  the  sky  blue, 
With  our  little  sister 

The  death-angel  flew. 

Oh !  then  tears  of   sadness 

From  fond  ones  were  wrung ! 
O !  then  songs  of  gladness 

By  seraphs  were  sung! 

Oh!  then  home  was  lonely ! 

For  at  the  hearth,  where 
She  had  chirruped,  now  only 

The  cricket  chirped  there. 


144  LITTLE   FANNY. 

All  life's  other  blisses 
Can  never  repay 

Those  prattles  and  kisses 
Which  Death  stole  away, 


TO    ELIZA   LOGAN. 

THOU  art  the  Yestal  of  the  sacred  fire 
Which,  flaming  on  the  altar  of  the  soul, 
While  truth  and  virtue  live,  shall  ne'er  expire ; 
And  ever  in  the  sacerdotal  stole 
Of  awful  purity,  thou  movest  through 
The  inner  temple  of  emotions  pure, 
And,  like  a  Sibyl,  so  expressest  true 
The  spirit's  mysteries,  that  we  are  sure 
Thou  hast  drank  inspiration  at  the  fount 
Castalian  of  the  genius-Helicon. 
Nymph  histrionic  of  Parnassus  mount ! 

Apollo  twined  a  wreath  of  thought  upon 
13 


146  TO    ELIZA   LOGAfl. 

Thy  sad,  imploring  brow,  and  sent  thee  down 

To  live  his  glory  forth ;  and,  like  a  song 

Of  love,  sung  with  the  gush  of  tears,  to  drown 

The  soul  in  passion's  sea,  thy  pathos  strong 

Along  the  heartchords  sweeps,  and  wakes  a  tone 

Whose  echoes  haunt  us  in  the  after  days, 

Like  memories  of  that  love  whose  spell  has  thrown. 

In  youth,  around  the  life  its  mellow  rays. 

Who  sees,  must  love  thee ;  for  thine  earnest  eyes 

Two  gushing  sighs  expressed  to  vision,  seem ; 

Thy  brows,  Aonian  eagles  in  the  skies ; — 

Bright  Incarnation  of  our  raptest  dream 

Of  Poesy  and  Passion !  all  that  hear 

Thy  sweet-tongued  inspiration — Sapphic  tones 

Which  voice  the  heartthrobs — give  to  thee  the  tear, 

As  night  gives  dew  when  breeze-stirred  blossom  moans. 

Thou  art  a  living  poem,  learned  by  heart 

For  worth  of  sentiment  and  wealth  of  rhyme ; 

And — like  it,  though  forgotten  be  its  art — 

Thou  hast  swept  chords  to  vibrate  for  all  time. 


THE    SPIKIT'S    KESPONSE, 

BRIGHT  Spirit  supernal, 
Oh !  say,  canst  thou  know, 

In  thy  home  eternal, 
The  sad  mortal's  wo? 

Canst  visit,  fraternal, 
Thy  brother  below? 

Not  a  thought,  not  an  emotion, 

Not  a  tear,  and  not  a  sigh 
Stirs  the  boundless  sea  of  spirit, 

But  it  ripples  to  the  sky ; 
And  the  gurgling  of  those  ripples 

On  the  empyrean  strand, 
Is  a  telephonic  language, 

Which  we  angels  understand. 


THE    SPIRIT'S    RESPONSE, 

Fleeter  than  the  wings  of  fancy, 

Silent  as  the  steps  of  night, 
We,  the  viewless  souls  of  heaven, 

Fly  the  maze  of  planets  bright ; 
Visit  Earth  and  flashing  Yenus, 

Visit  Jupiter  and  Mars, 
Visit  all  the  grand  creations, 

All  the  universe  of  stars. 


Most  we  visit  mortal  kindred — 

Those  who  think  of  us  with  death, 
With  the  flutter  of  the  pulses, 

And  the  rattle  of  the  breath — 
And  impalpable  to  senses 

Of  the  dwellers  on  the  spheres, 
With  their  souls  we  hold  communion, 

Sitting  by  the  fount  of  tears. 


In  the  rain  of  weeping  sorrow 
We  with  mortals  love  to  stay ; 

For  we  know  that  every  teardrop 
Washes  some  dark  sin  away ; 


THE   SPIRIT'S   RESPONSE. 

And  we  know,  too,  that  hope's  rainbow 
Comes  and  sits  upon  the  cloud, 

And  that  heaven  looks  the  brighter 
After  grief-storm  wild  and  loud. 


Brother,  never  thou  awakest 

From  a  dream  of  me  to  weep, 
Never,  shutting  eyelids  tearful, 

Sinkest  to  a  sighing  sleep, 
But  our  little  seraph  sister, 

With  her  wings  and  waving  hair, 
And  her  bright-eyed  cherub  brother, 

And  myself,  are  with  thee  there. 


Thou  art  sadder,  but  art  better, 

Since  death  parted  thee  and  me; 
For,  in  stead  of  two  to  watch  thee, 

Now,  my  brother,  thou  hast  three : 
Every  thought  of  us,  that  raises 

In  thy  heart  the  tearful  leaven, 
Charms  a  triad  of  blest  angels— 

Thou  art  so  much  nearer  heaven ! 


LOVE. 

FKOM  the  cradled  lull  by  the  hearthstone, 
To  the  coffined  lull  in  the  clod, 

O !  is  it  for  man  to  be  happy 
Hither  side  of  the  City  of  God? 

Though  gold  has  the  glittering  promise, 

And  we  seek  it  far  and  near, 
Not  gold  from  the  streets  of  Heaven 

Could  pave  a  paradise  here. 


LOVE.  151 

And  fame,  that  to  young  ambition 

Has  a  voice  of  thundering  roll, 
Sends  a  bolt  with  its  flash  of  glory — 

Where  it  strikes,  it  blasts  the  soul. 

All  the  joys  of  this  dark  existence 

Keep  fading,  one  by  one, 
Before  the  approaching  death-dawn, 

As  the  stars  before  the  sun. 

O !  is  there  for  man  no  pleasure 

That  will  bloom  forever  here, 
And,  transplanted  to  Eden,  flourish 

In  that  celestial  sphere? 

Yes,  love !  that  gives  to  the  spirit 

Wings  fluttering  to  aspire ; 
Love,  that  makes  our  human  heartstrings 

The  chords  of  an  angel's  lyre. 

Yes,  love !  that  skies  the  summer  bluer, 
And  paints  the  leaves  more  green ; 

That  knows  what  the  wild  bees  whisper, 
And  feels  what  the  bird-songs  mean. 


152  LOVE. 

Yes,  love !  that  weaves  wings  of  the  blossoms, 

To  winnow  the  fragrant  air ; 
That  wraps  in  a  white-cloud  mantle, 

And  climbs  the  cerulean  stair. 

Love  is  always,  always  climbing ; 

It  belongs  in  heaven  above : 
O !  our  souls  are  linked  to  the  angels 

In  every  kiss  of  love! 


SCOTTISH   SONG. 

TO    TOM    STANTON. 

HERE'S  a  ban'  wi'  you,  my  crony; 

Here's  a  heart  wi'  you  for  aye ; 
O'  guid  friends  the  best  of  ony 

Hae  ye  been  for  mony  a  day. 

When  misfortune's  frost  sae  chilly 
Withered  youthfu'  hopes  in  bloom, 

Of  a'  men,  ye  was  the  billy 
Gied  the  luckless  bardie  room. 


154  SCOTTISH    SONG. 

Ye  it  was  that  spak'  me  kindly, 
Ye  that  flung  the  han'  to  me, 

When  the  warl  folk  leered  half  blindly, 
Squinting  wi'  wealth's  dazzled  e'e. 

Mony  a  time  syne  then  thegither 
Hae  we  spent  in  social  glee, 

Till  our  hearts  hae  grown  to  ither, 
An'  na  moe  can  severed  be.    . 

When  the  moon  hae  blinked  at  gloamin, 
An'  the  sheen  stars  glinted  bright, 

Arm  in  arm  linked,  tentless  roamin', 
Oft  in  crack  we've  whiled  the  night. 

All  along  back  memory's  vista 

Through  life's  wilderness,  the  trees 

Stir  their  leaves  an'  blossoms,  kist  a' 
By  thy  friendship's  genial  breeze. 

Here's  a  han'  wi'  you,  my  crony, 
Here's  a  heart  wi'  you  for  aye ; 

O'  guid  friends  the  best  of  ony 
Hae  ye  been  for  mony  a  day. 


TO    OTWAY   CUKRY. 

Srrs  in  the  dell  the  sad  Muse  sobbing — 
Fond  sweetheart  of  those  ardent  days 

When  thy  young  bosom  thrilled  athrobbing 
With  her  divinely  whispered  lays. 

Lovelorn  she  sits  and  brokenhearted ; 

For  thou,  who  whileome  wooed  her,  now 
Hast  left  her  pining  passion-thwarted 

Beneath  the  mournful  willow  bough. 
« 

There  hangs  thy  harp,  whereon  she  gazes, 
As  listening  to  thy  luscious  chimes : 

Its  cunning  chords  the  weird  wind  grazes, 
And  faints  away  in  rapturous  rhymes. 


156  TO    OTWAY    CURRY. 

Yet  these  flow  not  with  thy  flush  spirit — 
She  dreams  them  thine,  not  long,  not  long ; 

The  wind  plays  on — she  does  not  hear  it — 
Her  heart  aches  for  thy  zeal  of  song. 

Her  pining  heart  aches — false  one !  ask  her 
Forgiveness  for  that  heart  betrayed ; 

0 !  be  no  more  this  moody  masker 
Of  soul  amid  life's  cold  parade. 

The  Muse's  heart  aches  for  thy  passion, 
The  flame  with  which  thy  youth  did  woo ; 

Turn  to  the  pensive  Maid  Parnassian, 
And  love  her  as  thou  wont  to  do. 

Wed  her,  and  sing  us  the  spousals, 
Sing  us  the  songs  of  thy  soul ! 

Poesy's  maudlin  carousals 
Quell  by  thy  sober  control ! 

Once  while  the  year  is  semental, 
Cuckoos  come  fluting  their  lay : 

Cuckoo  of  Song  Occidental, 
Charm  us  even  often  as  they! 


ON   AN   INDIAN'S   GKAYE. 

THE  sunset  blushes  of  the  Occident 

Glow  faint  and  fainter,  and  as  Twilight  waves 
Her  wizard  wand  athwart  the  firmament, 

The  quick  stars  spring  from  their  cerulean  graves 

In  pale  shrouds,  doubled  in  yon  brook  that  laves, 
"With  prattling  lapse,  the  foot  of  this  old  mound, 

Where  sleep,  perchance,  a  thousand  Indian  braves — 
Their  monuments  these  ancient  trees  around, 
Whose  leafy  meshes  sift  the  moonbeams  on  the  ground. 


158  ON    AN    INDIAN'S    GRAVE 


This  grave,  from  which  the  white  man  has  exhumed 

Some  bones  of  mortal  buried  long  ago, 
Mayhap  was  scooped  here  ere  had  Science  plumed 

His  starry  wings  to  pass  old  ocean's  flow. 

But  whose  the  skeleton,  no  one  may  know 
Again  on  earth ;  for  now  remains  there  naught 

Of  deed  recorded  or  of  name  to  show 
That  such  a  one  e'er  in  life's  battle  fought, 
Or  groveled  infamous,  or  deathless  honors  sought. 


Conjecture,  threading  through  the  darkling  path 
Of  dead  years,  may  behold  him  walk  the  chief 

Of  savage  warriors,  in  his  wild-eyed  wrath 
Wielding  the  tomahawk  with  vengeance  brief, 
Or  eking  out  his  tortured  prisoner's  grief, 

While  round  the  death-fire  dance  his  frenzied  rout 
Of  tattooed  clansmen,  shivering  every  leaf 

Of  these  old  trees  with  their  demoniac  shout 

Of  horrid  glee  to  see  the  victim's  life  go  out. 


ON   AN   INDIAN'S    GRAVE.  159 


A  hissing  flame-tongue  from  the  nether  hell 
Is  this  revenge,  which,  licking  up  the  tears 

Of  pity  at  the  fount  from  which  they  well, 

All  love's  flush  from  the  spring  of  passion  sears, 
And  through  the  tender  heartstrings  shriveling  veers : 

The  direst  fury  in  the  human  breast, 

It  flourishes  through  all  the  savage  years, 

Fatting  on  ignorance ;  yet  oft  is  dressed, 

Among  the  civilized,  in  Glory's  martial  vest. 


But  Fancy  limns  him  not  in  scenes  alone 
Of  barbarous  vengeance ; — round  the  council  fire 

The  sagamores  are  gathered ;  in  the  tone 
"Which  Nature's  savage  passions  aye  inspire, 
Stern,  iron  words  he  utters,  which  acquire 

Strange  force  of  meaning  from  his  gestures  strong, 
As  thunders  from  the  leap  of  lightnings  dire : 

Beneath  yon  tree,  whence  that  cicada's  song 

Comes  hoarsely,  haply  he  harangued  the  gloomy  throng. 


160  ON   AN    INDIAN'S    GRAVE. 


Strange  are  the  changes,  chieftain,  (if  such  thou,) 

That  time  has  wrought  here  since  then ;  strange  the  scene 
"Would  meet  thy  vision,  were  it  quickened  now : 

"Where  yonder  cornfields  wave  their  streamers  green, 

"Which  rustle  softly  in  the  breath  of  e'en, 
Tall  forest  trees  locked  arms  above  thee ;  where 

That  closure  limits,  crooked  as  the  mean 
System  that  made  it,  earth  spread  free  as  air, 
And  thou  and  thy  red  hunters  chased  the  wild  deer  there. 


Then,  too,  rude  wigwams  squatted  here  and  there 
In  leafy  twilight,  and  the  forest  maid, 

Of  black  bewildering  eye  and  streaming  hair, 
Poured  her  wild  lovesong  in  the  viny  shade, 
"While  at  her  feet  the  checkered  moonshine  played : 

Now  yonder  cluster  thick  the  village  homes 
Of  men  enlightened,  and  there  in  the  glade 

Stand  villas,  whence  the  blue-eyed  maiden  comes, 

And  with  her  pale-faced  lover  here  at  evening  roams. 


•n^ 

ON    AN    INDIAN'S    GRAVE. 


Like  as  the  red  cloud-glories  of  the  dawn, 
That  flaunt  the  orient  before  the  sun, 

In  his  uprising  are  consumed  and  gone, 
So  faded  these  wild  races,  one  by  one, 
In  civilization's  morn,  till  now  are  none 

Even  to  guard  the  graves  left  here ;  the  hand 
Of  Christian  white  man  ruthlessly  has  done 

Away  their  sacredness ;  and  now  we  stand, 

And  muse  of  human  bones  uncovered  in  the  sand. 


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O  what  a  wonder  is  this  human  life ! 

O  what  a  wonder  man !     He  lives  his  time, 
His  little  hour,  in  passion's,  glory's  strife ; — 

The  grave  ingulfs  him ; — from  some  other  clime 

Bards  come  and  spin  the  melancholy  rhyme 
Over  his  noteless  bones.     Such  is  the  lot, 

Alas !  of  all :  however  loud  the  chime 
Of  funeral  bells  when  we  He  down  to  rot, 

Our  graves  are  leveled  soon,  and  we  on  earth  forgot. 
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